Economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic may have widened the gap between the nation's rich and poor.
Job losses, especially in the dining and travel industries, have devastated many, while stock and other asset markets are booming on the back of global monetary easing.
At Isetan department store in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward, which regularly posts the highest sales numbers of all department stores in Japan, a worker in the jewelry section called strong sales last summer "mysterious."