The Democratic Party of Japan, the largest opposition party, on Thursday unveiled its own economic stimulus package. It's worth nearly 20 trillion yen and includes a system that would provide allowances for raising children but has little chance of being included in a supplementary budget to be debated during an upcoming extraordinary Diet session.
That's because the ruling Liberal Democratic Party has been busy forming alliances with smaller opposition parties that will allow it to overcome its minority standing in the Upper House and get its legislative agenda passed.
The LDP's lack of an Upper House majority in the previous Diet session gave the DPJ a chance to wield some power, and it responded with a compromise on bank recapitalization bills that its legislators partially drafted, much to the delight of many economists.