The main opposition parties claim that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's attempt to make the upcoming Lower House election a referendum on postal reform is simply a scheme to deflect public attention away from the ruling Liberal Democratic Party's fiscal failures under his leadership. Consequently, they are campaigning on broader social reform, with the current national pension system receiving the brunt of their rhetorical attack.

Though the opposition claims the public is more interested in pensions than post offices, it's not clear if the electorate understands the social-security morass any better than they understand postal privatization. To make it easier, the Democratic Party of Japan has said that its pension plan would guarantee at least 70,000 yen a month per person in benefits, which exceeds the Communist Party's more modest pledge of 50,000 yen. Not to be outdone, the Social Democrats have promised 80,000 yen.

These are minimums, but the message they convey is that Japanese people must lower their expectations. Under the present system, the average retired couple receives about 200,000 yen a month in benefits. Experts say that two people need at least 300,000 yen a month to lead a decent middle class existence. Under the proposed LDP pension plan, premiums will rise and payments will drop, so obviously future pensioners are going to have to make do with less, regardless of who's in power.