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Results of the 81st Opinion Survey on the General Public's Views and Behavior (March 2020 Survey)

April 7, 2020
Public Relations Department
Bank of Japan

Full Text [PDF 973KB]

Survey Outline

Survey period : From February 6 to March 3, 2020.
Population of the Survey : Individuals living in Japan who are at least 20 years of age.
Sample size : 4,000 people (2,101 people [i.e., 52.5 percent of the overall sample size] provided valid responses to questions).
Sampling method : Stratified two-stage random sampling method.
Survey methodology : Questionnaire survey (mail survey method).

Impression of Present Economic Conditions Compared with One Year Ago Percent, percentage points
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Have improved (A)	3.7	3.2	3.2	3.3
Have remained the same	67.1	67.3	62.7	56.0
Have worsened (B)	28.7	29.2	33.0	39.6
D.I. (A) minus (B)	-25.0	-26.0	-29.8	-36.3

Outlook for Economic Conditions One Year from Now Percent, percentage points
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Will improve (A)	7.0	6.1	6.5	5.8
Will remain the same	49.4	45.6	53.3	45.4
Will worsen (B)	43.1	47.8	39.1	48.0
D.I. (A) minus (B)	-36.1	-41.7	-32.6	-42.2

Impression of Present Household Circumstances Compared with One Year Ago Percent, percentage points
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Have become better off (A)	6.0	6.8	5.6	6.1
Difficult to say	52.9	49.8	51.4	50.8
Have become worse off (B)	40.5	43.0	41.7	42.2
D.I. (A) minus (B)	-34.5	-36.2	-36.1	-36.1

Perception of the Present Price Levels Compared with One Year Ago Percent
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Have gone up significantly	10.0	9.4	8.4	10.8
Have gone up slightly	61.2	61.1	56.1	53.2
Have remained almost unchanged	26.0	27.3	31.8	32.4
Have gone down slightly	1.8	1.3	1.9	2.1
Have gone down significantly	0.5	0.2	0.2	0.3

Outlook for Price Levels One Year from Now Percent
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Will go up significantly	11.7	11.7	7.7	6.1
Will go up slightly	68.8	68.1	65.6	62.3
Will remain almost unchanged	16.6	17.2	23.0	26.6
Will go down slightly	2.1	2.3	2.2	3.5
Will go down significantly	0.4	0.4	0.1	0.5

One of the Bank's Objectives Is to Achieve Price Stability Percent
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Know about it	30.5	-	29.6	-
Have read or heard of it, but do not know much about it	45.7	-	43.2	-
Have never heard of it	23.6	-	26.4	-

The Bank Has Set the Price Stability Target at 2 Percent in terms of the Year-on-Year Rate of Change in the CPI Percent
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Know about it	26.2	22.7	23.9	20.7
Have read or heard of it, but do not know much about it	33.0	37.8	28.8	35.6
Have never heard of it	40.6	39.2	46.4	42.9

The Bank Has Been Implementing Aggressive Monetary Easing Measures to Achieve the Price Stability Target of 2 Percent Percent
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Know about it	38.6	24.2	34.6	22.9
Have read or heard of it, but do not know much about it	38.0	38.1	37.3	37.6
Have never heard of it	23.0	37.0	27.1	38.3

The Bank Has Been Conducting "Quantitative and Qualitative Monetary Easing (QQE) with Yield Curve Control" Percent
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Know about it	20.8	14.5	18.5	14.2
Have read or heard of it, but do not know much about it	34.7	31.0	34.2	30.4
Have never heard of it	44.2	53.9	46.4	54.1

Confidence in the Bank Percent
	78th survey (Jun 2019)	79th survey (Sep 2019)	80th survey (Dec 2019)	81st survey (Mar 2020)
Confident	15.1	-	12.7	-
Somewhat confident	28.4	-	30.8	-
Difficult to say	47.0	-	46.4	-
Not particularly confident	7.0	-	6.0	-
Not confident	2.0	-	2.7	-

Inquiries

Planning and Analysis Group, Public Relations Department

E-mail : prdmail@boj.or.jp