A proposal to temporarily have a zero consumption tax on food products has emerged as a campaign promise made by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi (President of the Liberal Democratic Party) when she dissolves the House of Representatives at the start of the regular Diet session set to convened on the 23rd. Multiple sources revealed this on the 16th. The coalition government agreement between the LDP and the Japan Restoration Party in October 2025 stated that "we will consider legislation with the possibility of not subjecting food and beverages to the consumption tax for two years only." There is an opinion within the administration that if this is implemented, it should begin within fiscal 2026.
https://mainichi.jp/articles/20260116/k00/00m/010/382000c
9 Comments
Not sure if this is just a rumor to get more votes in the upcoming election or if it is actually going to happen. Hope it will but worried that something else is going to go up because of increase in government spending.
> temporarily have a zero consumption tax on food productsÂ
Sounds like a massive paperwork nightmare
Hopefully they make it work lol
We all know how the rice voucher thing worked out
This never works. Germany has tried multiple times reducing tax on gasoline, food, restaurant visits and energy. It never results in reduced prices, the suppliers just pocket the difference and use it to improve their profit margins.
Basically legal vote buying. I am also considering giving every Japanese person a million dollars. Vote for meÂ
So they decrease it for two years, reducing the amount of taxes that they take in by ~5 trillion yen from their roughly 70 trillion yen per year. Will they raise taxes somewhere else to make up? Or will they cut existing services? And who gets stuck with the blowback after two years and the consumption tax comes back?
These politician thought bubbles, why can’t they be more creative?
Does alcohol count as food? Chuhi has fruit in it 🙂
Japan’s tax-exclusive pricing is a total mess, so I think this would be a huge game-changer for groceries.
It’s legit hilarious how there are people who think consumption tax on food is somewhat relevant to the average household when what takes half our income is residential tax, insurance premiums (which will raise even more) and pensions. How about making us exempt of residential tax or stop overcharging for health insurance?
And after the two years hyper inflation and the prices go up even more. Wth are they thinking