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Settled accounts, FY2000–FY2024 · Published 5 August 2026

Where prefecture revenue comes from, and where it is spent, 2000–2024

Japan's prefectures together raised 41.7% of their revenue from their own taxes in FY2024, up from 32.1% in FY2000. Tokyo raised 72.2% and received no allocation tax at all; Shimane raised 18.2%. Of the ¥59.8 trillion that came in, ¥52.3 trillion was spent, a quarter of it on staff.

¥0the local allocation tax Tokyo received in FY2024 — the only prefecture that received none41.7% of all prefecture revenue came from local taxes · Tokyo 72.2% · Shimane 18.2%

Source: Survey on Local Public Finance, Revenue, Table 1: revenue by category, prefectures, FY2000-FY2024 · Local allocation tax was 16.8% of all prefecture revenue in FY2024, covering FY2000 to FY2024

01

What the local tax share measures

Local tax revenue divided by total revenue: the money a prefecture raises from its own taxes, against every yen that came in. For all 47 prefectures together it was 41.7% in FY2024.

The remaining 58.3% came mostly from Tokyo and from lenders. The local allocation tax, the general-purpose transfer that tops up prefectures with weak tax bases, was 16.8% of total revenue. Treasury disbursements, which are tied to particular programmes, were 11.4%. Borrowing through local bonds was 7.0%. The rest is spread across transferred taxes, fees, charges and asset sales, none of which reaches 5% on its own.

Two things this ratio is not. It is not a measure of what a prefecture could pay for out of taxes, because the denominator includes borrowed money: a prefecture that borrows heavily in one year sees its share fall even if its tax take is unchanged. And it does not describe local government as a whole — cities, towns and villages keep their own accounts, published separately, and are not added in here.

02

Seven prefectures raise a larger share than the country as a whole

In FY2024 only Saitama, Chiba, Tokyo, Kanagawa, Shizuoka, Aichi and Osaka were above the 41.7% national figure. The other forty were below it.

Every year on the map uses the same colour scale, so the country as a whole visibly darkens between 2000 and 2024 rather than each map being repainted to look the same. Two years break the trend and are worth stepping through: FY2011, when the national share fell to 30.2%, and FY2020, when it fell to 33.2% as the pandemic response pushed transfers and borrowing up.

The floor has moved but its shape has not. The four lowest prefectures in FY2024 were Shimane at 18.2%, Ishikawa at 18.9%, Wakayama at 19.1% and Kochi at 19.3% — all of them higher than any prefecture outside the top group managed in 2000, and all of them still raising less than a fifth of their revenue themselves.

Local tax revenue as a share of total revenue, by prefecture

Darker means a larger share raised from the prefecture's own taxes. Use the buttons to change fiscal year; the colour scale is the same in every year.

FY2024 · All prefectures 41.7% · Highest: Tokyo 72.2% · Lowest: Shimane 18.2%

0%77.0%
View data table · FY2024
View data table · FY2024
PrefectureLocal tax shareLocal allocation tax share
Tokyo72.2%0.0%
Kanagawa62.3%6.9%
Aichi55.2%5.5%
Saitama50.0%14.0%
Osaka48.0%11.1%
Shizuoka47.5%15.7%
Chiba46.9%12.4%
Hiroshima40.2%18.9%
Ibaraki39.2%17.0%
Okayama39.2%24.8%
Mie38.9%21.0%
Kyoto37.6%19.5%
Shiga37.5%22.8%
Fukuoka37.5%15.5%
Gunma37.4%17.5%
Tochigi36.1%17.0%
Miyagi36.0%16.9%
Hyogo35.3%15.5%
Gifu35.2%23.1%
Kagawa31.5%27.5%
Nagano30.9%21.6%
Nara30.9%32.3%
Fukui29.8%27.2%
Niigata29.6%24.0%
Toyama28.8%25.1%
Yamaguchi28.5%26.3%
Hokkaido27.6%23.4%
Ehime27.2%23.7%
Aomori26.8%31.5%
Kumamoto26.0%25.4%
Fukushima25.3%21.2%
Yamanashi24.0%25.9%
Kagoshima23.8%32.9%
Oita23.4%27.5%
Okinawa23.4%27.9%
Saga23.3%29.7%
Nagasaki22.3%32.7%
Yamagata21.8%29.2%
Iwate21.3%29.4%
Miyazaki20.9%29.2%
Akita20.6%32.9%
Tokushima20.1%29.8%
Tottori19.8%38.9%
Kochi19.3%39.6%
Wakayama19.1%29.3%
Ishikawa18.9%21.7%
Shimane18.2%35.3%

Source: Survey on Local Public Finance, Revenue, Table 1: revenue by category, prefectures, FY2000-FY2024 · All years share one scale

03

Forty-six of the forty-seven prefectures raise more of their own revenue than in 2000

The national share rose from 32.1% in FY2000 to 41.7% in FY2024, but not steadily: it peaked at 43.1% in FY2007 and fell back to 30.2% in FY2011.

The line is a record of the tax base, not of policy alone. It climbs through the mid-2000s recovery and the 2007 transfer of income tax revenue to local governments, drops after the financial crisis, reaches its lowest point of the twenty-five years in FY2011, recovers through the 2010s, and falls again in FY2020 and FY2021 when pandemic spending arrived as national transfers rather than local taxes.

Ishikawa is the one prefecture whose share is lower than in 2000: 18.9% against 21.6%. Its tax revenue barely moved, but its total revenue rose from ¥694 billion in FY2023 to ¥1,046 billion in FY2024 — the fiscal year of the January 2024 Noto Peninsula earthquake. It is a clean illustration of what the ratio does when the denominator moves: nothing about Ishikawa's tax base got worse.

Local tax share by prefecture, FY2000–FY2024

One prefecture at a time against the figure for all 47 combined. Use the menu to change prefecture; every prefecture is drawn on the same axis.

Tokyo · FY2000 65.5% · FY2024 72.2% · +6.7 points

20%40%60%80%0%200020052010201520202024
  • Tokyo
  • All prefectures
View data table · Tokyo
View data table · Tokyo
MeasureValue
Local tax share · FY200065.5%
Local tax share · FY202472.2%
Change over the period+6.7 points
Highest yearFY2007 (77.0%)
Lowest yearFY2021 (57.9%)
Local allocation tax share · FY20240.0%
Treasury disbursement share · FY20245.9%
Local bond share · FY20241.6%

Source: Survey on Local Public Finance, Revenue, Table 1: revenue by category, prefectures, FY2000-FY2024 · All years share one scale

04

Tokyo received no local allocation tax in FY2024

Tokyo is the only prefecture that received none of the transfer that fills the gap for everyone else. Shimane received an amount equal to 35.3% of its total revenue.

Tokyo received nothing in twenty-four of these twenty-five years. The exception is FY2011, when it received ¥3.5 billion, six hundredths of one per cent of its revenue. Aichi is the only other prefecture to have received nothing in any year, in FY2007 alone.

Comparing the top and the bottom shows why the rise in the national share does not mean convergence. Tokyo went from 65.5% to 72.2% and Shimane from 11.3% to 18.2%. As a ratio the distance narrowed, from 5.8 times to 4.0 times. In percentage points it did not move at all: 54.2 points in FY2000, 54.1 points in FY2024.

05

Where the money went in FY2024

The 47 prefectures took in ¥59.8 trillion in FY2024 and spent ¥52.3 trillion of it. Staff pay was the largest item at 24.6% of spending, and subsidies and grants paid out to others were 23.0%.

Sorted by where the money came from rather than by category, 59.7% of revenue was raised or already held inside the prefectures, 33.3% was handed over by the national government and 7.0% was borrowed. The spread behind that average is wide. Tokyo raised or held 91.2% of its revenue and took 7.2% from the national government; Kochi took 60.9% from the national government, the largest share of the 47, and raised 27.1% itself.

The dashed band on the right is the 12.5% of revenue that was not spent within the year. It is not a surplus in the everyday sense: most of it is money already committed to work that runs past the end of March and is carried into the next year, and the rest is the year's balance. Tokyo carried forward the largest share, 25.5% of its revenue, and Yamagata the smallest, 6.6%.

One pair of flows is larger than it looks. Loans made were 8.9% of spending, ¥4.66 trillion, and repayments of earlier loans were most of the 9.2% of revenue published as 諸収入 — ¥4.59 trillion of it 貸付金元利収入. Much of this is credit that revolves through the prefectures to small businesses and back each year, so both sides are inflated by a similar amount and neither is money the prefecture consumed.

Prefecture revenue and spending, FY2024

Every band is a share of that prefecture's own total revenue, so the picture compares composition and not size. Use the menu to change prefecture.

All prefectures · Total revenue 59,793,901,981 thousand yen · Where it went 87.5% · Not spent within the year 12.5%

Where the money came fromWhere it wentLocal taxes 41.7%Transferred national taxes 4.4%Municipal tobacco tax grant under 0.1%Special local grants 0.7%Local allocation tax 16.8%Road safety grant under 0.1%Contributions and shared costs 0.5%Usage charges 1.0%Service fees 0.3%Treasury disbursements 11.4%National facility grant under 0.1%Property income 0.6%Donations under 0.1%Withdrawals from own funds 3.3%Balance carried in 3.0%Miscellaneous receipts 9.2%Local bonds 7.0%Personnel 21.6%Goods and services 3.9%Maintenance and repair 1.1%Welfare assistance 2.3%Subsidies and grants paid 20.2%Debt service 11.1%Added to reserve funds 3.6%Investments and equity 0.8%Loans made 7.8%Transfers to other accounts 1.2%Cover for last year's deficit 0.0%Capital works 14.0%Not spent within the year 12.5%Total revenue · 59,793,901,981 thousand yen

Where the money came from

  • Raised or held by the prefecture
  • From the national government
  • Borrowed

Where it went

  • Personnel
  • Goods and services
  • Maintenance and repair
  • Welfare assistance
  • Subsidies and grants paid
  • Debt service
  • Added to reserve funds
  • Investments and equity
  • Loans made
  • Transfers to other accounts
  • Cover for last year's deficit
  • Capital works
  • Not spent within the year

Revenue is larger than spending in every prefecture. The gap is the settlement's 形式収支: money committed to work that runs past the end of March and carried into the next year, plus the year's balance. It is drawn as a band rather than dropped, because leaving it out would make spending look like all of revenue.

View the published breakdown inside each category

Transferred national taxes 4.4%

  • Local gasoline tax4.4%
  • Special tonnage taxunder 0.1%
  • Petroleum gas tax0.1%
  • Vehicle weight tax0.6%
  • Aviation fuel tax0.1%
  • Forest environment tax0.2%
  • Special corporate enterprise tax94.5%

Local allocation tax 16.8%

  • Ordinary allocation97.2%
  • Special allocation2.5%
  • Earthquake reconstruction allocation0.3%

Usage charges 1.0%

  • Tuition34.1%
  • Hydropower water charges5.5%
  • Public housing rents35.5%

Service fees 0.3%

  • For work entrusted by law25.9%
  • For the prefecture's own work74.1%

Treasury disbursements 11.4%

  • Compulsory education19.4%
  • Public assistance2.0%
  • Child welfare2.0%
  • Disability support1.5%
  • Construction works22.6%
  • Disaster recovery works3.4%
  • Commissioned work2.1%
  • Infrastructure block grant11.1%

Property income 0.6%

  • Income from assets held32.9%
  • Asset sales67.1%

Donations under 0.1%

  • From municipalities0.2%
  • Hometown tax donations43.3%
  • Corporate hometown tax31.8%

Balance carried in 3.0%

  • Free balance45.3%
  • Earmarked for carried-over projects54.7%

Miscellaneous receipts 9.2%

  • Late charges and fines0.5%
  • Deposit interestunder 0.1%
  • Public enterprise loan repayments0.8%
  • Loan repayments83.2%
  • Commissioned project income1.1%
  • Lotteries and racing4.3%
  • Other receipts10.1%

Personnel 21.6%

  • of which staff salaries73.9%

Debt service 11.1%

  • Principal repaid92.5%
  • Interest paid7.5%
  • Interest on short-term borrowingunder 0.1%

Capital works 14.0%

  • Ordinary construction94.7%
  • Disaster recovery5.3%
  • Unemployment relief works0.0%

Each figure is a share of the category above it. The published parts do not always add up to the whole category.

View data table · Where the money came from · All prefectures
View data table · Where the money came from · All prefectures
CategoryAmount (thousand yen)Share of total revenue
Local taxes24,936,025,73441.7%
Transferred national taxes2,631,272,5244.4%
Municipal tobacco tax grant1,182,387under 0.1%
Special local grants399,180,0240.7%
Local allocation tax10,067,038,91016.8%
Road safety grant22,580,948under 0.1%
Contributions and shared costs272,829,0030.5%
Usage charges607,614,0261.0%
Service fees177,095,2280.3%
Treasury disbursements6,800,747,90211.4%
National facility grant43,548under 0.1%
Property income365,916,2280.6%
Donations44,924,781under 0.1%
Withdrawals from own funds1,966,294,1443.3%
Balance carried in1,807,283,7443.0%
Miscellaneous receipts5,516,308,5069.2%
Local bonds4,177,564,3447.0%
View data table · Where it went · All prefectures
View data table · Where it went · All prefectures
CategoryAmount (thousand yen)Share of total revenueShare of total spending
Personnel12,890,369,37921.6%24.6%
Goods and services2,347,615,8033.9%4.5%
Maintenance and repair629,621,0891.1%1.2%
Welfare assistance1,351,969,6952.3%2.6%
Subsidies and grants paid12,052,607,67620.2%23.0%
Debt service6,653,523,90911.1%12.7%
Added to reserve funds2,145,393,1393.6%4.1%
Investments and equity492,239,9970.8%0.9%
Loans made4,660,400,9347.8%8.9%
Transfers to other accounts742,520,5671.2%1.4%
Cover for last year's deficit00.0%0.0%
Capital works8,347,631,77514.0%16.0%
Not spent within the year7,480,008,01812.5%—

Source: Survey on Local Public Finance, Revenue, Table 1: revenue by category, prefectures, FY2000-FY2024 · Survey on Local Public Finance, Expenditure by economic character, prefectures, FY2024 · FY2024 · Each prefecture is drawn against its own total revenue