The media coverage of a given public policy appears to have a great impact on political decision making related to the policy. However, political decisions also appear to reciprocally affect media coverage of the issue. This theoretical study investigates the intertemporal relationship between media coverage and political decisions. Our first model describes media outlets’ decisions correlated to the amount of coverage on public spending policy and demonstrates how the level of inappropriate government spending influences them. Our second model describes competition between two political parties and demonstrates how the amount of media coverage affects the parties’ decisions on their government spending policies. Finally, we examine the relationship between the amount of media coverage and the parties’ spending policy during particular periods, revealing their specific intertemporal effects upon each other.

The establishment of the Thomas Jefferson Center for Studies in Political Economy in the University of Virginia at Charlottesville was a realization of the idea of two graduate students for reviving the classic political economy. Since then, Buchanan and Nutter jointly worked for recruiting faculty members, calling over many famous but not-mainstream scholars, constructing curriculum for graduate students and raising funds to realize their research and education programs. With the arrival of Gordon Tullock to the Center as the first post-doctoral fellow, Buchanan's interest in research program was changed towards inquiry into the political behavior of individuals and the government itself. Their publication of The Calculus of Consent was genuinely ground-breaking for the birth of the Virginia School and Public Choice. Successive publications of works by Buchanan and Tullock on public choice along with the start of the Public Choice Conference and the journal, Public Choice, made Virginia School as the center of public choice studies around the world and deepened the methodological understanding of methodological individualism, rational behavior of individuals and politics as exchange.

Although Buchanan is normally best known for the pioneering work he has done to establish the sub-discipline of public choice as a part of mainstream economics, it is probably accurate to say that much work published in the sub-discipline and in the journal Public Choice is crucial distance removed from Buchanan's own approach to the study of collective decision making. While a significant proportion of the scholars working in the sub-discipline and publishing in Public Choice engage in formal mathematical modeling of political decision-making, Buchanan's work has had the institutional and constitutional orientation from the beginning of his career.

　To understand two fundamental questions for Buchanan, "What should economists do?" and "Why must economics be Constitutional Political Economy?," it is inevitable to exactly know his methodology of political economy as "science of exchange" and "catallactics," characterized by radical subjectivism, methodological and normative individualism, and the economy as a constitutional order.

This paper considers Buchanan’s contribution to public finance and points out how it can contribute to current public finance in Japan. Buchanan contributed to public finance in three ways. First, he analyzed public finance by not supposing on impartial and benevolent government that maximizes social welfare. Second, he dealt with collective decision making in budget processes. Third, he explored constitutional choice among alternative institutions of public finance.

　The suggestion his contribution makes to current public finance in Japan is as follows. We should make clear not only the difference between debt finance and money creation but also the difference between taxes and insurance premiums as a constitutional reform. Japanese people have to seek a path to overcome grave deficit dependence from our own viewpoint, by referring the generality principle that Buchanan claims as a constitutional reform.

As a proper discipline of applied social sciences a theory of economic policy has steadily evolved on the foundation of economic sciences as a whole. This evolution must be depend upon some leading scholar with social enthusiasm and endeavor to reform society in order to make a serious increase of human wellbeing. Professor Hiroshi Kato has not only made an invaluable contribution to the progression of economic policy through his academic works, but also devoted all his whole life to educating a great number of students over generations.

　Among a wide scope of the theories of economic policy, Professor Kato’s area of research ranges from inquiry into Modern Economic Growth Policy to Quantitative Analysis of Economic Planning in the Former Soviet Union, studies on Objectives of Economic Policy associated with Value Judgements and Democratic Decision Making Process of Economic Policy, Theory of Comparative Economic Systems and Optimum Society, advocacy of Welfare Society in Japanese Style, at last but not least, reviews on Possibilities of Convergence Theory among Different Systems beyond Ideology and Predictions about Post-Communist Systems.

　The author of this essay will do make a brief review on the evolution of the economic policy as an applied science mainly focusing upon the theory of comparative economic systems in the last century.

Economic Policies of Professor Kato had been based on Welfare Economics. He was always inspired by the motivation how to increase social welfare of the nations. In 1960s, he advanced his studies to Soviet Economy, while he proved the result of bottleneck in economic management by socialism.

　In 1970s, he was involved in government committees on public enterprises in Japan, which were suffered from chronic financial deficits, for inefficient management, and found the same disease in planed economy.

　Professor Kato encountered the theory of Public Choice, his interest was focused on non-market decision making mechanisms, which proves performances of agents in political process, lead to political failure.

　In 1980s he devoted to some major institutional reforms in Japan. He achieved the requirements for success, affected by the theory of rent seeking and some other models in Public Choice. Furthermore, Pulic Choice has improved its core position in the methodology of Policy Management.

As for Japanese economy, the 1990s after the collapse of the "bubble" economy will be called the "Lost Decade" even in today for "all 20 lost years" again. The long slump of Japanese economy is the result of the ability not to respond to globalization. That is, it is in the delay in reform of systems made unchanging in the thorough cost competition.

　Even if unlimited money market relaxation is able to cause inflation, the competitive power of a company is not necessarily recovered. There is no policy in revival of Japanese economy besides recovering the global competitiveness of a company and realizing expansion of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

　It seems that realizing conversion of the economy and industrial structure corresponding to change of market structure is a necessary condition for Japanese economy to escape from a long-term downturn.

The social system and rule have changed with the transition of age. The age may demand new social system and rule, and require its change. The role of the government tax commission in Japan has not maintained stably since 1950’s. Such fragility might be caused by political expectation and calculation.

　The strongest rival for the government tax commission has been the ruling party (LDP)’s tax commission. In 1980’s and 1990’s, when LDP overwhelmingly governed in politics, LDP’s tax commission had the power unequally. But even they sometimes failed to persuade the public opinion.

　The policy makers have been demanded to communicate to the public to introduce or change to new policy, especially in tax policy related to people’s daily lives. Professor Hiroshi Kato, who took lead to introduce the consumption tax in 1989 and to increase the tax rate from 3% to 5% in 1997, and had been chaired from 1990 to 2000, has been the great unparalleled persuader.

In this paper, I show a difficult to achieve breaking with nuclear power generation, lower electricity prices, and lower carbon society at the same time under technological constraint. This is important to determine an energy policy.

　A nuclear power generation is one of cheapest electricity generation. If we choose to break with this power generation system, we have to find a substitution system. A renewable energy system is higher cost than other systems. A coal fired power generation system release more carbon dioxide than other systems. Hence, we have to sacrifice any of one.