Welfare benefit reductions totaled about ¥300 billion between 2013 and 2018
The government's decision to lower the standard amount of welfare benefits three times between 2013 and 2015 resulted in welfare benefit reductions totaling about ¥300 billion ($2.1 billion) over about five years through 2018, an estimate showed Sunday.
Amid lawsuits in which welfare recipients around the country sought to have benefit cuts revoked, the Supreme Court is set to deliver a ruling on June 27 for an Osaka High Court case and another from the Nagoya High Court, where the rulings were divided.
If the plaintiffs win, the state may be required to pay the amount that would have been provided before the reductions.
The three reductions in the standard amount of welfare benefits affected the period from August 2013 to September 2018, according to the welfare ministry. During this period, the number of welfare recipients ranged from about 2.09 million to about 2.16 million.
The government decided to reduce welfare benefits during that time period based on factors such as the cost-of-living falling.
In a document, the ministry estimated the fiscal effect of the first standard amount cut to be around ¥15 billion in fiscal 2013, the second cut to be about ¥26 billion in fiscal 2014 and the third cut to also be about ¥26 billion in fiscal 2015. This led to reduced government budget spending of ¥15 billion, ¥41 billion and ¥67 billion, respectively, from fiscal 2013 to fiscal 2015.
The ministry has not made an estimate for fiscal 2016 and beyond, but a reduction of the same scale as in fiscal 2015 apparently continued as there was no significant change in the number of recipients. As a new standard amount revision was implemented in October 2018, Jiji Press estimated the reduction at ¥33.5 billion for fiscal 2018, half of the ¥67 billion for fiscal 2015, bringing the overall total amount reduced to more than ¥290 billion.
Regarding the estimate, a ministry official said, "It is not a figure issued by the ministry, but I can't say it is wrong."
Tetsuro Kokubo, an attorney representing the plaintiffs in the lawsuit in Osaka, said that if the plaintiffs win the case at the Supreme Court, "The government should apologize to all recipients and pay the unpaid amount based on the standard amount before the reductions."
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