Politics pays as average income of Japanese lawmakers hit 16-year high of Y26.57 million in 2018

Jul 09, 2019 | News On Japan

Jul 09, 2019 (Japan Times) - Lawmakersâ€™ income averaged Â¥26.57 million in 2018, the highest in 16 years and up Â¥2.45 million from a year before, parliamentary data showed Monday.

The average was inflated by the Â¥1.74 billion income reported by Jiro Hatoyama, a House of Representatives member of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party. Without his income, the average lawmakerâ€™s earnings was similar to the year before.

Hatoyama, 40, got the bulk of his income â€” Â¥1.66 billion â€” through sales of unlisted stocks he inherited. He is the second son of the late Internal Affairs Minister Kunio Hatoyama.

The top nine earners were all from the LDP, which is led by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Abe was 27th in the overall ranking, with his income totaling Â¥40.28 million on the back of a Â¥1.09 million increase in miscellaneous income, including from his television appearances related to the September 2018 LDP leadership election.

The second-highest earner was Taichiro Motoe, an LDP member in the House of Councilors and a former lawyer. Motoe, 43, reported almost Â¥500 million in income, most of it from selling shares in a company where he is representative director and chairman.

Ichiro Aisawa, 65, an LDP Lower House member, took third spot at Â¥311.66 million, with Â¥207.51 million earned from sales of stock in a family-owned company. He was the top earner in 2017 with Â¥711.93 million.

Among Cabinet ministers excluding Abe, Science and Technology Policy Minister Takuya Hirai ranked first, with income of Â¥50.53 million, and Finance Minister Taro Aso, who concurrently serves as financial services minister and deputy prime minister, came second, with an income of Â¥37.11 million.

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