Households' Purchasing Behaviors before and after the Change in the Rate of Consumption Tax
研究了2015年4月日本消费税税率变动前后家庭支出的波动，发现不同年龄和收入群体的价格变动率存在显著差异，尤其是同一商品组内个体间的价格差异导致不同收入群体的价格变动率差异较大。
The change in tax rate on consumption conducted in April 2015 increased household expenditure in March, and decreased it in the following months. This up and down in consumption led to large fluctuations in Real Gross Domestic Product. After the change in the tax rate, movements in real and nominal expenditure started to differ to a large extent. This paper investigates the heterogeneity of the rate of price change among individuals based on scanner data. More precisely, we analyze how the tax revision affected the rate of price changes differently across age and income groups. Our empirical analysis reveals that the individual level rates of price change reacted very differently to the tax change. In particular, consideration of commodity level price differential across individuals within the same commodity group creates large differential in the rate of price change across income groups.