In 2009, the Bank of Japan conducted a public survey on deflation. The results were not what the esteemed central bank wanted or expected – at least not after a “lost decade” of falling prices. Instead of expressing horror at the idea of deflation, 44 per cent of those surveyed deemed it “favourable”; 35 per cent felt neutral about the phenomenon; and just 20.7 per cent described it as “unfavourable”. Although a subsequent survey painted a slightly more negative picture, the pattern was clear. As Kathy Matsui, vice-chair of Goldman Sachs Japan, says: “More Japanese actually feel that deflation is a positive than a negative.”
This intriguing finding recently popped back into my mind for two reasons. The first is the fact that most western central banks are now engaged in a startling new fight to prevent deflation, almost at any cost. It is an accepted tenet of modern economics that deflation is a terrible scourge that must be avoided. Deflationary spirals and depressions, of the sort seen in America in the 1930s, are the nightmare that haunts the central banking world.
Thus the European Central Bank is unleashing an unprecedented wave of asset purchases, partly sparked by the fact that consumer prices have been sliding steadily lower. In Sweden and Switzerland, similar efforts are under way. So too in Japan.