Tax Hike Right Away—Election Pledge Discarded in 3 Days???

The Koizumi administration, which had pledged not to raise taxes on salaried workers, is reportedly abolishing the flat-rate tax cut less than 3 days after the election ended. For a household with annual income of ¥7 million, this will mean a tax increase of about ¥80,000. No doubt it will resort to sophistry such as, “Abolishing a tax cut is not a tax increase.” Having elected as prime minister someone who declared in a Diet response that “not keeping campaign pledges is not a big deal,” people have only themselves to blame.

Furthermore, unlike Canada’s Chrétien administration, there also seems to be no plan to pair the tax increase with spending cuts twice as large. That makes it a big government as well.