To Fool the Public, or not Fool the Public: Debate on the ‘Green Tax’
The government is deep in debate over when (and not if) to introduce the so-called ‘green tax’, aimed at reducing ‘greenhouse gas emissions’. But it seems clear that the debate is really about whether or not they will try to fool the public.
Early next year, a provisional tax surcharge (more wonderful political-speak) on gasoline and other fuels will expire, sending about 2.5 trillion yen that is currently being collected as taxes back to the private sector. This was a promise that the DPJ made in the lead up to the election, as part of their ‘from concrete to people’ policy to help the ‘regular Joh’. At the same time as this promise was being made out of one side of the mouth, another was being made to levy a new tax on greenhouse gas emissions. Coincidentally…. the two would virtually even each other out. A classic case of giving with one hand, and taking away with the other…
The debate that is all the rage now in the government is about how to sell this to the public. Do they implement the ‘climate change tax’ at the same time as the gasoline tax expires, so that they can explain the former away as simply a replacement? Or do they wait to implement the ‘climate change tax’ until the public has had time to celebrate the fact that they have had their taxes lowered, with the expiry of the gasoline tax…?
In other words, do we tell the public now, or later that those tax cuts we promised them are merely going to be shifted somewhere else, so they will end up paying for them after all… Deputy Prime Minister Kan, Finance Minister Fujii, and Internal Affairs and Communications Minister Haraguchi are pushing for the former option. But the Prime Minister seems keen to allow the public to celebrate their lower tax burden until after Upper House elections in the summer, before implementing the new tax. He said that “If we link the debate on scrapping the provisional tax surcharge to the debate on the proposed environmental tax… we will be criticized by the public for breaking our promise’”. And yet somehow, if he just leaves it for a few months, it will all be better….
Not everyone is getting the wool pulled over their eyes however… Nine industrial groups issued a petition on Monday stating that “it’s not clear how the money will be spent, and it can’t be anything other than a tax increase to [secure] revenue sources”. Since it is in fact not clear how the money will be spent, nor what the exact cost of the taxes will be, it is hard to disagree with this statement. There needs to be a great deal more clarity from the government on the reasons for the tax, and the way in which funds will be used - beyond the simple rhetoric about ‘saving the world’….
Sources:
Asahi: Fiscal challenges ahead
Yomiuri: Divisions emerge on green tax
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Tags: Environmental Taxes, Gas Levy, Green Tax, Tax Cuts
So basically they are going to get the tax no matter what they just need to figure out how to dress it?
Is this something the Japanese people want even? I don’t know much about Japanese politics so am really curios.
Yeah, it looks like the current tax is going to be replaced with a new one, and the question is whether or not to let the public think that they are getting a tax cut…
The second question is a more complicated one. There does seem to be a lot of support in Japan for ‘climate change measures’, but as for specific policies I think there is far too little real information about what is going on for most of the public to have an informed opinion… There is far too little debate on the issues imho. And the more the government tries add taxes and other burdens I think they will face a lot of blow-back from the private sector….
@Dumb Otaku
Japanese politic’s is not truly representative. In the end the government will push through any law that means they get to funnel more free money into their pockets. Especially an ambiguous tax like this. It’s just free money. I would mind less it the money went to reconstruction but we all know how much the Tokyo government really cares about the Tsunami victims.