Japan to continue gasoline tax surcharges

Japan’s Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama announced decisions on several key policy issues, saying his administration will retain gasoline-tax surcharges next fiscal year while it won’t impose any income limitation on planned family allowances. “I’ve thought about environmental and economic matters” in making the decision to keep in place the provisional tax rates, Hatoyama said. “Our tax revenues are falling very sharply” due to an economic slump, he said. Hatoyama, however, said Tokyo will stick to its plan to halve taxes being charged by the central government based on the weight of automobiles next fiscal year. Hatoyama added that he wants to decide whether and when to introduce environmental taxes “within a year.” (December 21, 2009)