Japan - Consumer Confidence

The survey seeks to gain a quick understanding of shifts in consumer perception as a tool in evaluating economic trends.

The Consumer Confidence Survey, the Monthly Consumer Confidence Survey and the One-person Household Consumer Confidence Survey have been integrated into this survey since April 2004.

• Survey Area

     47.8 million households in Japan, not including foreigners, students and institutional households.

• Survey Coverage

     6,720 households (households more than two-persons are 4,704,one-person households are 2,016) , sampled using a three-level stratified random sampling method of city/town/village, local unit and household.
     Sampled households will be the survey object for 15 months.

• Timing of the Survey

     The survey is conducted on the 15th of every month.

• Survey Organizations and System

     The Prime Minister is in charge, and delegates the conducting of the survey to the Shin Joho Center. The survey uses direct-visit and self-completion questionnaires.

  * The survey method changed in April 2007. In the past, the survey was conducted by telephone in months other than June, September, December and March of the subsequent year; those four months used the same methods as the current methodology.

• Survey Variables

  (1) Consumer perceptions
  (2) Price expectations
  (3) State of the household

     * The items below have been revised from the April 2004 survey.

  1. Calculation of the consumer confidence index is now the simple average of four consumer perception indexes, altering from five indexes, including perception of price.
  2. In the items of consumer perceptions, questions on price perception have been abolished. Instead, price expectation is introduced as a quantitative questionnaire.
  3. Concerning the questionnaire on state of the household, gender of the head of the household and the type of main income have been introduced.
• Calculating the Consumer Confidence Index
  

  (1) Consumer perceptions of the following four categories are surveyed: overall livelihood, income growth, employment and willingness to buy durable goods. Respondents are asked to evaluate on a scale of one to five what they consider the prospects to be for the five subjects over the next six months.

  (2) Points are then allotted in accordance with the one-to-five scale for each category based on the anticipated effects on consumption. The consumer perception index is calculated by computing the weighted average of the points of the results (component ratio).

  Consumer perception index:

     The following evaluation points in the five response categories are multiplied by the component ratio(%) and totaled: positive responses (improve +1), (improve slightly +0.75); neutral response (no change +0.5); negative responses (worsen slightly+0.25), (worsen +0).

  (3) The consumer confidence index (original figure) is then calculated by simply averaging the four consumer perception indexes (original figures).

• Seasonal Adjustment Method

  Seasonal adjustments are carried out using the X-11 of the Census Bureau of USA.

  As for the quarterly data, seasonally adjusted series are available, since the consumer perception index and consumer confidence index of households have been released every quarter before April 2004. On the other hand, until we see accumulation of a certain monthly time series data of the survey of households, seasonal adjustments can not be executed for monthly data.