politics

Abe says gov't needs to ease impact of sales tax hike

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Abe says the government should study specific steps to cushion the impact of the planned consumption tax hike

I know how : cancel it.

12 ( +12 / -0 )

People are just gonna spend less and save more. Everybody knows this except...him!

10 ( +10 / -0 )

The idea of the government spending its revenue more responsibly is completely off the radar.

11 ( +11 / -0 )

As the head of the government, he really should know we are taxed on our salery, taxed on what we spend and supremely taxed on our death. I can twist a whet towel only so many times.

7 ( +7 / -0 )

I know how : cancel it.

Short and very sweet! Well said!

People are just gonna spend less and save more. Everybody knows this except...him!

spend less: yes

save more...not exactly. people are just going to struggle more and tighten their belts.

As the head of the government, he really should know we are taxed on our salery, taxed on what we spend and supremely taxed on our death.

I know right?? unfortunately, these LDP twats couldn't find their butts with both hands.

Heaven help us all.

9 ( +10 / -1 )

If they raised the tax 1% per year it would cushion the impact somewhat, but it looks like Abe is thinking about spending even more money he doesn't have instead. Perhaps he will postpone the increase yet again.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Ease impact, my thinking and I'm no star for this but Ease impact tells me don't do it? Unless the point is to strip any wealth from the population and stuff certain families pockets. So nice he wants to supply a cushion while taking as much as he can. I need the cushion as my wallet is empty and does not give me any padding.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says the government should study specific steps to cushion the impact of the planned consumption tax hike in 2019 on the economy.

Ummm how about forcing companies to pay REAL wages so people have money to spend and stop ripping off their workers, now there is a idea.

9 ( +10 / -1 )

I know how : cancel it.

Better yet, roll it back to the 5% and with increased wages the economy will boom again!

Ummm how about forcing companies to pay REAL wages so people have money to spend and stop ripping off their workers, now there is a idea.

Forcing a company to increase wages is counter productive, the people have to stop accepting slave wages, and slave live conditions.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

Heard the same thing when they increased the sales tax the first time. Didn’t see any easing of impact except for cutting corporate taxes and ‘urging’ companies to increase salaries. No doubt this is just more ‘lip service’ from the lip service king.

6 ( +7 / -1 )

I’m gonna plant more veggies and learn how to fish.

12 ( +12 / -0 )

Learn to fish, plant eatable plant life ahh a new tax. Not one word about government spending that's odd. Take everything give little, I urge you all.

7 ( +7 / -0 )

He rightly notes there will be a consumption boom before the tax hike and a slump after it.

My guess is he wants to spend loads of money he doesn’t have to fake a stable economy in the aftermath, because he knows Abenomics has not lived up to the promises he’s made.

But why bother? If your spending is the reason that you need to hike tax rates, spending more is not the solution. Unless you are an idiot central planner.

Just suck up the hit, because it is expected (and you judge it necessary), or cut some useless spending.

Making your debt problem worse is totally unjustifiable as an option.

Isnt there a politician or bureaucrat in Japan with a different playbook to the one that they have been failing with for lost decades now?

2 ( +2 / -0 )

By postponing it yet again for instance! You’ve done it 3 times before, no damage by postponing it once more, Abe?

As long as you get to become Japan’s longest reigning prime minister, the economy doesn’t matter for you! You should’ve introduced this consumption tax years ago. But you just postponed it to gain people’s support, because you knew they wouldn’t like it. Just to stay in power!

Fiscal reforms are though, but necessary. People aren’t supposed to like it!

1 ( +2 / -1 )

Japan needs new industries for the 21st century. It should compete against the US by building a massive military industry, bomb people around the world to deplete armament so recurring income can be generated in building more bombs to bomb more people.

Then, it should increase the number of people working for, and contracted to work for, the government. Half of US households now deliver their income from the governement, so Japan has much room for growth in this sector.

Japan should also increase the salaries of government workers, like the successful US model. Japanese government workers make far less than te private sector. That is old fashioned thinking from the days when people worked fo les money for the government out of service to their nation. Now, government workers have the highest wages in the nation and Japan should follow that lead.

Japan taxes are far too low now. Japan could follow the European or UK system and tax everyone more so more government tax collectors can be hired to collect the higher taxes.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

here is the best way to ease the impact' DON'T RAISE TAXES MORON

0 ( +2 / -2 )

At first the tax hike was to pay for a little more of the out of control social security program spending than it already is (still racking up 30+ trillion yen debts in any case).

Then it was to pay for making child care free (although there is insufficient child care service to make free to begin with, and making it free will make the child card shortages even worse).

And now he wants to spend even more money to cover the economic impact of the hike, the purpose of which he has changed from the original plan which was supposed to be to take a baby step towards fiscal rectitude. So he is going to make the debt worse, for a plan that was supposed to be a step towards fiscal rectitude.

We came full circle. Consumption tax rates are going to have to go even higher in future because this clown just can't stop spending too much money.

I volunteer to pay for the child care services my family receives. I don't need the taxes taken off me so that it can be given back to me in that way. It's my donation to the rest of the tax payers. Who else is with me? If we all pitch in and pay our own way then Abe won't need to spend more money and could indeed cut the consumption tax rate back down.

We can find 10 trillion of savings out of 98 trillion yen of expenditures each year if we all pitch in together, can't we?

2 ( +3 / -1 )

Actually I think Japan has to up its taxes in order to keep its social security system from going pop and thus ensuing chaos in Japan.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

"Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says the government should study specific steps to cushion the impact of the planned consumption tax hike in 2019 on the economy."

And yet another, "We've decided to do A, and we know it will harm us, so we'll think about forming panels to discuss ways to make groups to talk about how we should make a government study to think about decisions on who to appoint to discuss hiring to talk about it later".

thepersoniamnow: "Actually I think Japan has to up its taxes in order to keep its social security system from going pop and thus ensuing chaos in Japan."

No, there are other things they can do, they just want to take the easy route.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

At least 10% is easy to calculate. Australia's consumption tax (GST) went from 0% to 10% in one hit. Other countries are in the teens and Japan has gone from 3% to 5% to 8% so 10% is the next logical step. A 500ml bottle of water at a convenience store is still reasonably cheap in Japan at about 100 yen. A bottle of water (600ml) in Australia is something like 300 yen at a convenience store. Yes, wages need to go up in Japan but prices haven't gone up that much in Japan over the past 20 years.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Australia’s 10% Goods and Services Tax wouldn’t have stood a snowball’s chance in hell of being successfully introduced had the Government there tried to emulate Japan’s feed ‘em BS and keep ‘em in the dark mushroom farmers playbook. Getting the public there onside with the GST necessitated detailed consultations with all interested parties and across the board streamlining of existing sales taxes, some went up, whilst others went down, to ensure fairness and equity and a zero net loss of purchasing power. The Todai educated clowns who run affairs here never bothered to factor public cynicism nor expectations of consultation into their plans; they simply introduced a tax that raised prices across the board sans any kind of compensatory adjustment for loss of purchasing power. Exhortations to companies to ‘do the right thing’ and raise wages have been largely ignored, hence cynicism reigns supreme and we see people splurging before the increase and then battening down the hatches after. Ostrich like, and with utter contempt for the notion of fairness, equity, and consultation, they’ll be seeking once again to test Einstein’s definition of insanity.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

Australian public debt to GDP is about one eighth of what Japan’s is, so the background to the respective hikes in each country are rather different.

Australia may have wanted to make their tax system more efficient, perhaps? “Broad base low rate”

In Japan the tax system efficiency could use some work, but they have at least had a flat rate consumption tax, which is the efficient type. On the other hand they spend upwards of 95 trillion a year versus revenues of 55 or 60. No fidgeting for tax system efficiency gains will plug that sort of budget hole.

It’s either massive tax hikes or spending reforms (cuts) in Japan’s case. A little more growth would help too but that don’t seem to know how to get that without making the debt problem worse.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

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