PM Takaichi's food tax-cut bill went into debate with no funding details.
0.1%
of agree votes likened it to a company
759 comments read to the bottom · every number is below
The most-agreed comment
Please stop things like Go To that only some people who eat out can use - they cost wasted money and staff time on paperwork. It would help people more to treat restaurants as food and cut the consumption tax there too. Price rise after price rise has pushed up what households have to carry. For working people, and for the odd meal out - and to get people spending, too. I'd like the tax rate looked at again.
Show original Japanese
外食の一部の人しか使えないGOTOとかは、無駄な経費や事務作業の人件費もかかるのでもうやらないでほしい。
飲食店も食品扱いで消費税減税したほうが国民にとって助かります。
数々の物価高で家計負担が増えてます。
働く人にとってや、たまの外食くらい、消費喚起の意味でも。
税率を見直してもらいたい。My lady's reading
This is what I thought when I saw the article.
Politicians who take every last question to the person at the top - that is asking the wrong person.
And a comment section full of pent-up frustration that won't even try to picture this as the office life it surely knows.
That is exactly how responsibility and knowledge end up resting entirely on individuals.
How could that ever be a good thing?
That is my reading.
Some of it can be counted. Who did this thread want answers from? How many comments pictured it as a company or a workplace? And did the thread hand responsibility and knowledge to the prime minister personally?
The news
At 1:11pm on 20 October 2026, Jiji Press published a story on Yahoo! News.
That day, the bill to cut the consumption tax on food went into debate in a full sitting of the lower house, with Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae present to explain it and take questions.
The bill would cut the consumption tax on food and drink to 1% for two years from April 2027. It would also start a new cash benefit for working people on middle and lower incomes, linked to income and called the "support payment to ease the burden on workers". For the first two years the payment would be worth 1% of consumption tax, with the full scheme starting in fiscal 2029. I counted the comments on that benefit plan in a note three days ago.
In the chamber, the prime minister called the benefit "the best method, in terms of giving enough support and giving it quickly". But the funding - about 5 trillion yen a year - and the design of the new benefit were not spelled out. On which income levels would qualify and how much would be paid, the answer was only that they "will be considered, taking the Diet's deliberations into account", the article says.
On funding, the Finance Minister, Katayama Satsuki, said again that it would be secured "without relying on deficit-covering bonds, by reviewing both spending and revenue, so as to keep the trust of the markets".
If the tax comes down, it will be the first cut since the consumption tax began in 1989. The government and ruling parties call it the most important bill of this Diet session and want it through the lower house by early November. But the ruling side is in the minority in the upper house, where there is no clear path to passing it; the question is whether it can move towards the opposition and win a majority there, the article ends.
Context for readers outside Japan
The consumption tax is Japan's sales tax: 10% on most things, 8% on food bought to take home. The cut here would take food to 1% for two years; eating in at a restaurant stays at 10%, which is why several comments below bring up restaurants and a "Go To" style support scheme for them. Many comments below point out that most opposition parties also campaigned on cutting the consumption tax at the last lower-house election. In the Diet, the prime minister and ministers answer in full sittings; the detailed questioning usually comes later, in committees, where officials can answer too. The comment section below the article on Yahoo! News Japan is one of the busiest public forums in the country. Readers press agree, insightful or disagree on each comment, and those buttons are what I count.
68 to 32 - 759 comments, about 18 hours in
I read all 759 parent comments, as they stood at 7:10am on 21 October, about 18 hours after publication. At 7:13am the site listed 758 parent comments, and the article showed 999 comments in total.
The buttons came to 7,512 agree, 263 insightful and 3,673 disagree presses. Positive presses against push-back stand at 68 to 32.
It was a thread with a lot of push-back. 168 comments drew more disagree than agree presses, and they hold 48.7% of all the disagree presses. The vote leans towards the top: the first comment alone holds 20.0% of the agree presses, the top 10 59.9%. Meanwhile 348 of the 759 comments - 45.8% - did not receive a single agree press.
On the whole, it was hard on the government. The 472 comments (62.2%) doubting or criticising the government, the prime minister or the bill hold 62.0% of the agree presses. The 176 (23.2%) backing or defending them hold 34.6% - and 42.6% of the disagree presses as well.
At the top: "treat restaurants as food too"
(This is the most-agreed comment, shown at the top of this page.)
This is the top comment in the thread: 1,499 agree, 53 insightful and 168 disagree presses, with 42 replies. It holds 20.0% of all the agree presses.
It says nothing about funding, or about what the prime minister said in the chamber. What it says is that the support scheme for eating out is a waste, and that prices are squeezing households. The 106 comments writing of how hard life is - prices, take-home pay - hold 31.3% of the agree presses, but only 11.3% without this one. The 117 wanting the tax cut done, or widened to eating out, hold 43.2% - 9.7% without the top 2.
The 2nd comment (1,013 agree presses) said that raising MPs' allowances and civil servants' pay went through without anyone asking about funding. The 123 aiming at other targets like these - MPs' allowances, wasted tax money - hold 22.5%, or 9.0% without the 2nd.
The largest group doubted the food tax cut itself. Price rises will cancel it out, shops won't cut their prices, two years is pointless - 238 comments, 31.4% of the thread, holding 33.5% of the agree presses. The 4th (332 agree presses) noted that over 4,000 items went up in price in September, and over 2,000 in October.
The comment my lady shared: 51st
As for funding the consumption-tax cut, why not ask the opposition parties, who have been campaigning on "cut the consumption tax" at election after election? Surely they had worked out, in concrete terms, how they would fund the cut themselves. Since the ruling and opposition parties alike have promised a tax cut, now is the time to put their heads together and work to make it happen.
消費税減税の財源については、これまで選挙で「消費税減税」を訴えてきた野党に聞いてみればいいんじゃないですかね。
当然、自分たちが減税を実現するための財源についても、具体的に考えていたはずでしょうから。
せっかく与野党ともに減税を掲げてきたのですから、今こそ知恵を出し合って実現に向けて協力してほしいですね。It is 51st by agree presses (4 comments have 12; it comes first of those in the site's order): 12 agree, 0 insightful and 13 disagree presses, with no replies - one of the 168 that drew more disagree than agree.
This comment aims at the opposition. You campaigned on the cut, so show your own funding; stop dragging it down; work together - the comments aimed at the opposition come to 86, 11.3% of the thread, holding 15.2% of the agree presses. The highest was the 3rd.
[...] And yet, the moment the government actually brings a bill, they turn round and attack it for having no funding and a poorly designed scheme. Of course the funding needs checking - but then what funding did they have in mind when they made those promises themselves? [...]
［…］
それなのに、いざ政府が法案を提出すると、今度は財源がない、制度設計が不十分だと追及する。もちろん財源の確認は必要ですが、それなら自分たちが公約を掲げた時、どんな財源を想定していたのでしょうか。
［…］The 3rd comment in the thread: 367 agree, 5 insightful and 147 disagree presses, with 16 replies.
Nearly as many pulled the other way. Show the details now; passing the bill first and filling it in later is wrong - the 82 comments (10.8%) demanding this of the government hold 13.2% of the agree presses. The highest was the 8th (187 agree presses), asking for more than "reviewing spending and revenue": say concretely what will be reviewed, and by how much.
Both sides drew plenty of push-back. The comments aimed at the opposition hold 20.1% of the disagree presses, and those demanding the details from the government 22.2%.
Checking my lady's reading
My lady said that politicians who take every last question to the person at the top are asking the wrong person.
According to the article, the prime minister did not give the funding or the design of the benefit - but on funding, the Finance Minister, Katayama Satsuki, did answer: it will be secured without deficit-covering bonds, by reviewing spending and revenue.
In this thread, 3 comments remarked on how questions were being put to the prime minister, with 1 agree press between them. All 3 criticised the opposition's questions. I found none going as far as saying who should answer what - that the details are for ministers or officials rather than the prime minister. The 13 comments mentioning the Finance Minister hold 1.9% of the agree presses; 120 of those presses are on one comment, the 13th, which hopes that Minister Katayama and Prime Minister Takaichi will take on the Ministry of Finance properly. Without it, 0.3%.
The comments aimed at the opposition - the side asking the questions - did hold 15.2%. But most of them said the opposition should show its own funding. They did not say that taking everything to the person at the top was the wrong way to ask.
She also said that the comment section, full of pent-up frustration, won't even try to picture this as the office life it surely knows.
The comments that compared it with a company or a workplace come to 6 - 0.8% of the thread - with 7 agree presses in all: 0.1%. The highest was this one.
The prime minister is the one running the country, so this endless funding question, and what gets paid to whom and how, have to be made clear. I'd like to see the PM at more press doorsteps, too. Tell the public what you want to do, and how.
国の経営者総理大臣なんだから、
いつまでもしつこい財源問題も、
何をどう給付するのか、
ハッキリしないと。
ぶら下がり会見にも積極的に参加して欲しいね。
何をどうしたいのか、国民に向けてメッセージすべきでしょ。4 agree, 0 insightful and 0 disagree presses, with no replies - 100th by agree presses.
5 of the 6 went the same way: picture it as a company, and that is exactly why the top should show the basis and the substance.
In an ordinary company, if you gave a presentation saying "we'll do all this, and it'll work" without showing any basis, you'd be laughed out of the room.
一般の会社で根拠も示さず「これだけの事をします、効果あります」なんてプレゼンしたら嘲笑されちゃいますよ。0 agree, 0 insightful and 0 disagree presses, with no replies - 642nd. The 6th said that any company or household cuts its spending when its income falls, and turned on those asking about funding. I found none among the 759 that pictured it the other way: in a company, the person in charge answers the detail, and the person at the top doesn't know everything.
The 7 comments writing from their own job or business hold 1.4% of the agree presses. The highest, the 18th (93 agree presses), said that changing the rate in the middle of the switch to the invoice system means the till systems cannot possibly be replaced in time.
As for frustration, there was plenty. Comments on how hard life is, together with those aimed at other targets, come to 207 - 27.3% - holding 52.9% of the agree presses, and 19.5% even without the top 2.
She also said that this is exactly how responsibility and knowledge end up resting entirely on individuals.
The 109 comments (14.4%) praising or blaming Takaichi personally hold 6.4% of the agree presses, and 14.4% of the disagree presses: 88 blaming, 20 praising or defending. 6 questioned the prime minister's own grasp of the subject (0.2%), and 22 called it irresponsible, or said nobody takes responsibility (5.5%).
The closest was this one.
I do think the tax cut is a stretch - not just Takaichi's, the ruling side's as a whole - but I was even more let down by the opposition asking the childish question "if Takaichi isn't prime minister in two years, who takes responsibility?"!
高市さんのというよりも与党としての消費税減税にも無理があるとは思うが、野党質問の「2年後、高市さんが総理大臣出なかった場合は誰が責任を負うか」の子供じみた質問をする野党にはもっと失望した！1 agree, 0 insightful and 2 disagree presses, with no replies - 303rd. I have not checked whether the question it describes was really asked.
Her last line - how could that ever be a good thing? - is not something that can be counted.
What I have not checked
I did not watch the Diet session. What the prime minister and the Finance Minister said comes only from the article.
Which comment went where was decided by reading each one, not by searching for words. The 759 were split into 8 batches read against the same guide, and I reread the top 130 myself. Please read the figures as approximate.
60 comments (7.9%) contain words abusing the prime minister or MPs. They hold 1.2% of the agree presses. They are counted, but not quoted here.
In closing
My lady said that politicians who take every last question to the person at the top are asking the wrong person.
These 759 comments split almost evenly between wanting answers from the prime minister and wanting answers from the opposition: 13.2% for showing the details now, 15.2% aimed at the opposition. I found none saying the detail is for someone other than the prime minister to answer.
6 pictured it as a company, holding 0.1% of the agree presses. 5 of them said that, for exactly that reason, the top should answer.
That is as far as counting goes.
The top five comments by vote
Ranked by upvotes. Left of the slash is agree, right is disagree. This is where the resentment actually sits.
- 1st 1499 ∕ 168 Please stop schemes like Go To that only some people who eat out can use - they cost wasted money and staff time on paperwork. It would help people more to treat restaurants as food and cut the tax there too. Price rises have pushed up what households have to carry
- 2nd 1013 ∕ 187 People keep saying 'funding', but raising MPs' allowances or civil servants' pay needed funding too, and I don't remember anyone making an issue of it. Both the ruling and opposition parties put forward the tax cut, so get on with it. The talk of payments to restaurants has very thin data behind it
- 3rd 367 ∕ 147 The opposition was supposed to be for the tax cut. They campaigned on it, and yet the moment the government brings a bill, they attack it for having no funding and a poor design. Then what funding did they have in mind when they made those promises? People want their lives made a little easier, not the two sides dragging each other down
- 4th 332 ∕ 71 Rather than the tax cut, look at what food prices are actually doing - over 4,000 items went up in September, over 2,000 in October. If prices rise by more than the tax falls, ordinary life doesn't get any better
- 5th 287 ∕ 54 Help the people who are working now and carrying this country. Subsidising particular industries to make up for the tax cut makes no sense. Couldn't the whole tax come down to 5% or 8%? Cut out the wasted work and act quickly
Every number from this thread
I read all 759 parent comments, as they stood at 7:10am on 21 October 2026, about 18 hours after publication. At 7:13am the site listed 758 parent comments, and the article showed 999 comments in total, with 236 replies on the parent comments. The buttons came to 7,512 agree, 263 insightful and 3,673 disagree presses - 68 to 32. Agree against disagree alone is 67 to 33. It was a thread with a lot of push-back: 168 comments drew more disagree than agree presses, and they hold 48.7% of all the disagree presses. The vote leans towards the top: the first comment alone holds 1,499 agree presses - 20.0% - the top 3 38.3%, the top 10 59.9%, the top 20 74.5%. 348 of the 759 comments (45.8%) got no agree press at all, and 236 got no press of any kind. The average comment is 105.2 characters long; the 185 under 40 characters (24.4%) hold 3.0% of the agree presses. 75 of the 236 replies sit under the top 2 comments, and 720 of the 759 have none. Which way did the thread lean? The 472 comments (62.2%) doubting or criticising the government, the prime minister or the bill hold 62.0% of the agree presses. The 176 (23.2%) backing or defending them hold 34.6% - and 42.6% of the disagree presses. By content: the 117 wanting the tax cut done, or widened to eating out, hold 43.2%; the 238 (31.4%) doubting the food tax cut - price rises will cancel it, two years is pointless - 33.5%; the 106 writing of how hard life is 31.3% (11.3% without the top comment); the 123 aiming at other targets such as MPs' allowances or wasted tax money 22.5% (9.0% without the 2nd). The 104 saying there is no need to show the funding yet, or that the money is there anyway, hold 22.1%; the 82 worried about the debt, the weak yen or interest rates 9.5%. Now the count against my lady's reading. She said politicians who take every last question to the person at the top are asking the wrong person. According to the article, the one who answered on funding was the Finance Minister, Katayama Satsuki. 3 comments remarked on how questions were being put to the prime minister, with 1 agree press between them; all 3 criticised the opposition's questions. I found none going as far as saying the details are for ministers or officials to answer rather than the prime minister. The 13 mentioning the Finance Minister hold 1.9%, 120 of those presses on a single comment - 0.3% without it. The 86 (11.3%) aimed at the opposition, the side asking the questions, hold 15.2%; the 82 (10.8%) demanding the details from the government now, 13.2%. She also said the comment section, full of pent-up frustration, won't even try to picture this as the office life it surely knows. The comments comparing it with a company or a workplace come to 6 (0.8%), with 7 agree presses in all - 0.1%. 5 of the 6 used the comparison to demand answers from the top: in a company you'd be laughed at for presenting a plan with no basis; the prime minister runs the country, so the prime minister has to make it clear. The 6th said any company or household cuts spending when income falls. The 7 writing from their own job or business hold 1.4%. Comments on how hard life is, together with those aimed at other targets, come to 207 (27.3%) and hold 52.9% of the agree presses (19.5% without the top 2). She also said that this is how responsibility and knowledge end up resting entirely on individuals. The 109 comments (14.4%) praising or blaming Takaichi personally hold 6.4% of the agree presses and 14.4% of the disagree presses - 88 blaming, 20 praising or defending. 6 questioned the prime minister's own grasp of the subject (0.2%); 22 called it irresponsible, or said nobody takes responsibility (5.5%). The closest was a comment (303rd, 1 agree press) saying the opposition had asked who would be responsible in two years if Takaichi were no longer prime minister, and criticising that question; I have not checked whether that question was really asked. Her last line - how could that ever be a good thing? - is not something that can be counted. 60 comments (7.9%) contain words abusing the prime minister or MPs; they hold 1.2% of the agree presses and are not quoted here. Which comment went where was decided by reading each one: the 759 were split into 8 batches read against the same guide, and I reread the top 130 myself, so please read the figures as approximate. The comment my lady shared is 51st by agree presses: 12 agree, 0 insightful and 13 disagree presses, no replies - one of the 168 that drew more disagree than agree.
Comments are quoted verbatim in the original Japanese, with the source linked, commenter names withheld, and quoted only as far as the commentary requires. Translations are mine. Source articles may expire (retrieval dates noted). The substance of this piece is the author's commentary.
Next
Japan floats a payment of about ¥30,000 a year for 20 million lower-paid workers.
PM Takaichi says Japan is considering gift vouchers and a revived "GoToEat" for restaurants hit by a tax cut.
Tokyo's Bunkyo ward mailed payment reminders in envelopes covered with "open it!", emoticons and 15 drawn eyes, then apologised.