Midway into his four-year term as governor, Tom Wolf is finally getting it.

Wolf this week said he’ll reverse course when he presents his next state budget. This time, he won’t propose steep increases in sales or personal income taxes to cover runaway government expense.

Wolf, a York Democrat, told The Associated Press he will instead propose a budget balanced with cuts and steps to make state government operate more efficiently.

He said he’s not ready to discuss any steps he’ll take to save money, or whether he’ll seek to increase aid to public schools, a pet objective of the Wolf administration. But Wolf did draw attention to a tough decision last week to eliminate some positions in state government that will save about $100 million a year.

The governor’s change of direction is praiseworthy on several levels. The most pragmatic admission is that Wolf’s approach to the budgetary process in the past two years has gone nowhere. The GOP Legislature has rejected every penny of his proposed sales and income tax increases. A third year of the same approach is unlikely to yield any other result.

More importantly, he’s not simply acquiescing to the view and the will of a Republican majority in the Legislature. He’s gotten more in touch with the will of Pennsylvania’s voters and tax payers. A Keystone state that perennially votes blue blushed red in November, handing all 20 of its Electoral College votes to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump while returning Republican Pat Toomey to the U.S. Senate — and in the process, voicing a growing dissatisfaction with the governor’s own Democratic Party and its track record of rising taxes and spending.

The issues haven’t changed much in this, Wolf’s third year at the helm: public employee pension funds that absorb dollars the way cosmic black holes absorb mass and energy; statewide K-12 and post-secondary education entities living beyond their means; a struggle over whether — and how much — to tax the state’s fledgling natural gas industry; and maintaining the nation’s largest highway system.

And to be fair to Wolf, he has governed under a split mandate: voters chose him over a second term for Tom Corbett in a stinging rebuke to the Republican one-term governor; but at the same time, they strengthened the GOP’s grip on the state House and Senate.

Maybe Trump’s win in November signaled a tipping point for Wolf: take strides to meet the Republicans midway on budget objectives.

Whatever his underlying motivations, Wolf’s comments this week represent a refreshing change in Harrisburg. Let’s hope it sets a better tone for the new year.