Japan needs to double the ¥73 trillion it’s already budgeted in extra spending to ensure a recovery from the pandemic, says an influential Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker who helped shape the country’s economic strategy.
Kozo Yamamoto, who played a key role in crafting the fiscal and monetary framework known as Abenomics and is readying new proposals for Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, says Japan needs another big dose of fiscal medicine that’s as ambitious as the aid bill just passed in the United States.
He says the Bank of Japan can’t do much more by itself, even as investors obsess over what the bank might deliver at a policy review next week.