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Saturday, July 5, 2008 Vice finance minister eyes autumn tax talksKyodo News
New Vice Finance Minister Kazuyuki Sugimoto, who became the ministry's top bureaucrat Friday, expects full-fledged discussions on raising the consumption tax to begin in the fall. Sugimoto, who previously headed the Budget Bureau, said in an interview that recent remarks by Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda do not mean preparations for a tax hike will be postponed. Fukuda recently said he was thinking about the tax hike "from a long-term perspective, like two or three years." Sugimoto said that since the consumption tax is closely connected to future financing for the nation's rapidly aging society and ballooning social security costs, the situation "does not allow us any delay." He said the subprime woes in the United States, skyrocketing oil prices and strong growth in emerging economies have all brought the global economy to a "turning point," and fiscal structural reforms for debt-ridden Japan will be indispensable. "We need to boost Japan's potential over the long term, and our fiscal system should become sustainable," Sugimoto said. The new vice minister said he entered the Finance Ministry in 1974 in the midst of the first oil crisis, and soon encountered pressure to issue government bonds to cover shortfalls in state revenues. "I have always taken great pains to battle increases in budget requests," he said. |
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