Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said his administration will "make every effort to steadily achieve" its fiscal rehabilitation goal in fiscal 2015, while promising to streamline public spending.
Abe's remarks came during a meeting Monday of the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy, where the administration presented the basic outline of the fiscal 2015 budget.
According to the outline, new debt issuance will be kept below that of this year and the administration will review expenditures, including those for social security programs that have been ballooning due to the rapidly graying population.