Looking at indicators of consumer sentiment that can capture households' spending attitudes relatively early, these continued to show some weakness before the tax hike, whereas there seems to have been a pick-up to some extent after the tax hike, mainly led by the category of "overall livelihood" in the Consumer Confidence Index (Chart 10).
However, it is too early to make an assessment on households' spending attitudes at this point, and we would like to carefully examine additional data when they become available. 5  II. Price Developments Next, I will explain price developments (Chart 11). A sustained decline in prices continued in Japan for many years.