| dc.description.abstract | The purpose of this study is to explore whether Japan’s policy of increasing consumption tax affects how Taiwanese travelers assess and arrange their outbound trips. The Japanese government has played an important role in promoting the local economy by developing tourism. According to the data published on the official website of the Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO), in July 2018, the number of foreign tourists to Japan reached a record high of 2.832 million, an increase of about 5.6% compared with the same period in 2017. However, on April 1, 2014, Japan raised the consumption tax rate from 5% to 8%. According to a survey on Taiwanese travelers, the average time of outbound trips made by Taiwanese in 10 years from 2006 to 2015 is about 0.3-0.6 per year. With regards to the total number of outbound tourists, except for two drops (about 0.15 – 0.2) occurred in 2008 and 2009 due to the financial crisis, and the overall trend shows a gradual increase of outbound tourists year on year. In 2015, 88% of Taiwanese outbound trips were made to other Asian regions, of which 33.7% were in Japan and 27.5% in mainland China, indicating that Taiwanese travelers’ preference for Japan. This study aims to compare the situations before and after the implementation of consumption tax increase policy in Japan in 2014, and explores whether Taiwanese travels were affected by this policy. Moreover, in the first half of 2015, the exchange rate of NTD to JPY selling price dropped to below 0.25, and this study intends to discuss whether Taiwanese travelers were solely motivated to travel to Japan because of the exchange rate changes and whether Japan’s consumption tax increase policy has exerted some impacts as well. The data source of this study is obtained from Tourism Bureau of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC) (2015) and it was published in the public edition of the Survey on Citizens’ Travel Situation in 2014 (AG020014) and the public edition of the Survey on Citizens’ Travel Situation in 2015 (AG020015). This study constructs regression models on variables and uses the Difference in Difference (DID) method to compare the differences before and after the policy. Empirical findings of this study reveal that the increase of Japan’s consumption tax rate from 5% to 8% does not significantly
influence Taiwanese travelers to go to Japan; by contrast, the continuous drops of JNY (exchange rate) exert relatively significant influence on Taiwanese’ outbound trips to Japan. | en_US |