Eco Watchers Survey Current

It is the current-conditions half of Japan's Economy Watchers Survey, run by the Cabinet Office. It asks 2,050 purposively chosen watchers whether conditions improved or worsened versus 3 months ago. Watchers are frontline observers in household, corporate, and employment roles across 12 regions, not random consumers or managers. Running monthly since the January 2000 survey, its headline is a DI, a diffusion index from 0 to 100 for the direction of change.

Responses are collected from the 25th through the end of each survey month by web, telephone, or email. Results appear in the following month, typically around the 8th, at 14:00 Tokyo time, with the December round sliding to mid-January.

Each release shows national current and future DIs for the next 2 to 3 months as adjusted and raw values with shares. It also gives 3 field DIs, 12 regions plus a Tokyo subtotal, graded A to E reasons, and a separate reference level DI. Tables come as PDFs, Excel sheets, CSV reason files, and an English summary, with past adjusted values revised each year.

The headline follows its 3 fields, which track different frontline viewpoints.

• Household activity, 68.6%: shop, restaurant, service, and housing watchers capturing traffic, sales, prices, and customer behavior.
• Corporate activity, 21.6%: manufacturing and non-manufacturing staff capturing orders, sales, prices, and client conditions.
• Employment, 9.8%: placement and staffing watchers capturing openings, job seekers, hiring, and employment types.

The October 2022 survey, published November 9, 2022, shows how parts can diverge. Current conditions rose 1.5 points to 49.9 while future conditions fell 2.8 points to 46.4, on a seasonally adjusted basis. Raw readings were 51.1 for current and 48.2 for future, with household and corporate up while employment slipped as the headline rose. All 3 future fields fell, yet the summary still pointed to a rebound, with concern about price hikes ahead.

1. Question: Each watcher rates direction versus 3 months ago on 5 grades from better to worse. The level question on whether the economy is good stays out of the index.
2. Points: Better scores 1, slightly better 0.75, unchanged 0.5, slightly worse 0.25, and worse 0.
3. Formula: DI equals 1.0 times percent better plus 0.75 times slightly better plus 0.5 times unchanged plus 0.25 times slightly worse. Worse adds nothing.
4. Seasonal adjustment: The headline removes regular seasonal patterns by X-12-ARIMA, a method from the U.S. Census Bureau. Raw values minus seasonal indexes give adjusted values under an additive model.
5. Illustrative example: With shares of 10, 25, 40, 20, and 5%, DI is 10 plus 18.75 plus 20 plus 5, or 53.8. National, household, and corporate totals are valid-reply weighted averages of adjusted parts, so a field can oppose the headline. Adjusted DI then subtracts that month's seasonal index.