Prime Minister Fumio Kishida promises a “new capitalism” to tackle the inequalities caused by the pandemic
With the coronavirus marking the minimum of infections, most of the restrictions lifted and 71% of the population already vaccinated, Japan goes to the polls this Sunday. At stake are not only the 465 seats in the Lower House of the Diet (Parliament), but the political stability that the country has enjoyed since 2012 and the economic recovery after the pandemic.
All polls give the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) of Fumio Kishida the winner, who earlier this month replaced the coronavirus-worn Yoshihide Suga as prime minister. In turn, Suga had relieved Shinzo Abe last summer, who had been in power since 2012 but had to resign due to health problems as in 2006.
Chosen a month ago by internal vote of his party, Kishida aspires to end this old custom of Japanese politics to carry out his program. But it remains to be seen whether the conservative PLD achieves a majority of 233 seats in the Lower House, where it now has 276 deputies. If he does not succeed and has to rely on his governing partner, the Komeito Buddhist party, Kishida will be weakened and may not end up lasting more than a year, as there will be elections to the Upper House in July 2022.
In order to win over voters, the prime minister has promised a “new capitalism” that better redistributes wealth to tackle growing inequalities. As the third largest economic power, Japan enjoys one of the highest standards of living and most of its 125 million inhabitants fall into the middle class. But two and a half decades of stagnation after the Asian Crisis of 1997 and the coronavirus have exposed the weaknesses of its development model, which seems to have peaked. For the first time in 40 years, Save the Children has had to distribute bags of food this summer in more than 3,000 households, of which 40% had no income or were half that before the Covid.
Although Abe’s economic stimulus has doubled the Japanese stock index and raised profits for large companies by as much as 30%, the median salary has only risen 1,106 yen (8.40 euros) in a decade, according to Bloomberg. When the pandemic hit and forced businesses and borders to close, the nine million Japanese with the lowest incomes lost twice as much income as the wealthiest two million.
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