Provisional Translation

Q.

I would like to ask about linking My Number ID numbers to individual savings accounts. At a press conference last week on the 22nd, Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications Takaichi said that a two-stage approach is being considered with the transfer of benefits and other payments in mind, first linking My Number to a single account and then making it obligatory to link up all accounts. I would like to hear your thoughts on this, as well as your views on the opinion that linking will allow income and assets to be ascertained and thus make taxes more equitable.

A.

When accounts are linked to My Number and something like the present situation occurs, it has undoubtedly become possible to make 100,000 yen transfers more quickly to accounts that can be identified through the My Number system. Many people have realized that this approach is quicker, so the number of My Number Card applications has increased to perhaps 60,000 or 70,000 per day. There thus seems to be a high degree of recognition of this benefit. From what I hear, the process is extremely fast. The fact is that many people received the benefit payments quickly, and this is only to be expected because of how convenient it is. We are now working on a request basis, but we are looking sometime around next January to pass relevant laws and regulations regarding linking of bank accounts to My Number ID numbers, and some people think all accounts should be linked. What is the reason for individuals having so many accounts, I wonder. Why is it necessary to have so many accounts? One reason given during the Koizumi administration was that banks might fail, and payoffs would not be made for any savings in excess of 10 million yen. This policy was put in place during Minister Heizo Takenaka’s time in office. We were opposed to this. I recall opposing limiting coverage to savings of 10 million yen or less when I was serving as chairman of the Policy Research Council. Those with more than 10 million yen in their accounts moved everything above that amount over to another bank. The number of accounts thus steadily increased because, if a person had 100 million yen, he would hold 10 accounts. This is probably the origin of the practice. I thought it strange but inevitable that people would find it necessary to open up so many accounts, and this appears to be the reasoning behind that. Any ordinary person could see that, if a bank failed, savings above 10 million yen would not be repaid. They thus went about doing this intentionally, whether for good reasons or bad, but in the end that is how this came about. As we seek to get a handle on all of these accounts, will people approve of the National Tax Agency knowing every last detail about their own incomes, assets and cash holdings? What do you think?

Q.

If you carefully explain it and people see it as a trustworthy system, I do not think there will be a problem.

A.

That is a difficult thing to determine. People do not always openly express themselves like a newspaper; some might say they approve when they might actually not, and many would balk at having all accounts linked. In that sense, I understand that everyone might be on board with the idea that linking up one account would make things faster but, when linking up all accounts is suggested, some people would say “hold on a second”, not because they are up to something improper but because the general public hates having all of their information captured. There are still some countries that insist on doing so. Countries like China are very thorough in this regard, even going so far as introducing facial recognition. However, Japan is not such a country. We have had people take part voluntarily, even with the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, and I think this has been of great significance. While we cannot say anything specific at the present stage, we will be examining approaches with an eye toward January, and I think we can do this. The fact is that this My Number approach is very efficient. When I think about it, it started more than a decade ago when I was Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications, when I repeatedly questioned whether people would actually use it, and ultimately it did not really catch on, because being told how important it was, everyone just put their numbers aside somewhere at home. Although urged to use it, people found no real use for it. Some elderly people use their My Number card in place of an ID card after surrendering their driver’s licenses, but the vast majority of people have not been using theirs. I do have one myself, but I cannot remember a time when I felt it necessary to use it. I think that is the reason it did not really gain any traction. People were told to memorize their numbers, but many do not remember theirs at all. Things might be different if the use of My Number becomes more popular and a growing number of people come to see it as convenient, with insurance and other services requiring it, but until then I do not know in what way or to what extent the public will understand this.