The 2013 version of the Economic Arrangements Law presents the Israeli public with order of priorities and economic approach of the coalition headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which has adopted the outlook and opinions of Yesh Atid.
According to the preliminary versions distributed over the past few days, the government says it intends to implement some of the Law's clauses to improve the overall growth potential of Israel's economy and reduce inequality and social gaps. How will it do this? Finance Minister Yair Lapid's answer is that measure will be taken that will lead to a rise in the level of employment and reduce negative incentives that encourage unemployment and chronic poverty.
Simply translated that means that Lapid want to try and compel the haredim(ultra- orthodox) through the Economic Arrangements Law, to go out to work. This is the principle linking municipal rates and day-care subsidies to the ability to earn a livelihood of both partners in a marriage, and limiting the age of studying for men. To this must be added the planned reduction in child allowances, which will be part of the cuts to the state budget.
The question is how exactly is the rise in the level of employment among the haredim going to bring about a "reduction in social gaps," as the Ministry of Finance claims? In its present form, with the current rules of the game in the employment market, implementing these clauses in the Economic Arrangements Law will be a major cause of widening the circle of impoverished workers. Lapid and his friends in Yesh Atid can proclaim as loudly as they want that they are full of good intentions but those who will profit from their plans are the manpower companies.
The budget department's required alibi The desire to integrate the haredi community into the employment market, and bring an end to the "yeshiva studying society" reflects a worthy and vital goal, and even among those communities voices have been calling for this in recent years. But so that this desire won't end in a social tragedy an appropriate infrastructure must be set up to take them into the job market.
A real system must be established for professional training, a measure that the IMF has recommended in the past. There must be more aggressive enforcement of the minimum wage law and labor laws. And above else legislation should be enacted on a "Basic Law for Social Rights," that will protect workers from damaging employment and anchor the right to organize, and provide minimum job security for disadvantaged workers.
However, because we are talking about the Netanyahu government, it is highly unlikely that such laws will move forward in the current Knesset. Instead we are likely to find a situation in which vast numbers of people are thrown into the job market without proper training and without protection. Most of them will be employed by manpower agencies or small companies where they will receive especially low wages.
The Economic Arrangements Law's response to these issues, and the Finance Minister's answer, are included in the Law - coercing a core curriculum onto the haredi community: English, Hebrew and math. The question is how exactly will this contribute to reducing gaps? To tell the truth, these same topics in the state education systems don't exactly prove that it is possible to surmount social gaps. The very opposite, Israel's education system is a well-oiled mechanism for creating inequality.
Thus we also have to ask if the Finance Minister and the Prime Minister are ready to establish a national program to education that will relate to all Israeli citizens including haredim and Arabs. Are the pair of leaders ready to invest billions in reducing classroom sizes, training teachers, and improving school buildings?
Without these conditions being met, the only achievement will be forcing the core curriculum on the haredim, and providing the alibi required by the budget department at the Ministry of Finance to reduce government spending by several billions, and everything in the name, of course, of "reducing social gaps."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 29, 2013
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