On Tuesday 14 Elul 5773, the government’s monthly child allowance cut goes into effect. While for many families this spells disaster, cutting from an already ailing pocketbook, Finance Minister Yair Lapid calls it “a historic event, nothing less”.
Lapid explains the move is part of his party’s platform and he feels that while the government is allocating enormous sums of money for the nutrition of the nation’s children, the cut in monthly payments represents a new and welcome “work culture”. He adds that statistics support his view – that monthly child allowances do not extricate families from poverty but have a negative effect, perpetuating the poverty. Lapid adds that poverty among families in which both parents are working full time has dropped to under 5%.
He feels this places the responsibility in the hands of the parents, compelling them to get out and work to support their families. He supports giving incentives to workers, especially low wage earners, but opposes the monthly child allowance payments. Lapid explains the government cannot continue funding parents who are capable of working but choose not to.
(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)
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20 Responses
Yet his primary “noise” is against hareidim, almost all of whom are employed (well, by American standards, someone who learns in an institution and receives money other than not having to pay tuition and dorm fees, is considered employed). Israel can eliminate virtually all unemployment among hareidim by adopting American definitions.
So why do they pay the MKs in the Knesset?
I thought Lapid was liberal, but his statement would fit right in with the Republican party in the US.
shouldn’t have to find all the drug addicts either
#1,2,4, the truth hurts, does not it? Akuperma, let’s adopt this definition or that definition… how about straightness?
akuperma – you strike me as a fairly intelligent individual, so why do you insist on being m’dayik on tiny issues of semantics to childishly try and prove the “other side” wrong?
Guys in kollel are essentially full time students receiving a stipend. I have a hard time believing anyone in America would consider that “employed” in the sense of the word most people use it. Just because the full time student in questions is a grown adult with a wife and kids to feed instead of a single young person doesn’t change the nature of the their occupation. Perhaps you would contend that anyone who does a certain task and receives payment for doing so is employed. Does that mean a teenager whose parents give him a weekly allowance for chores he does around the house would also be considered “employed?” Perhaps in a technical sense you could argue yes, but come on here we’re talking real normal life not semantic quirks.
I would invite you to ask your average kollel man how he describes himself in his one words. In learning? Full time learner? Something along those lines? I doubt they themselves would say “I work.”
I myself work a full time job, but because of my appearance people often just assume that I’m in kollel and when speaking withe me where I learn. I reply that I work and they response is always “oh ok,” never “yes of course, that’s what I meant. Learning is also a job.”
I by no means wish to bash or degrade anyone who chooses to learn full time. I’m also not saying it’s easier to learn full time than to work. All I’m saying is that learning is not employment and anyone in learning themselves will readily tell you that.
#3 – Lapid is a conservative, but more in the European sense (with an empahsis on anti-semitism) rather than in the American sense (which woujld imply the strong belief in religious freedom). He is clearly to the right of any Israeli party other than Likud and Bayit Yehudi in matters of national security.
lapig is liberal and that is why is picking on the Charedi.
He hates religion just like all other liberals
lapid, you fool!
let’s see your brethren the chilonim hire your enemies the chareidim, then we can talk about “real” unemployment …
of course it won’t happen, your brethren the chilonim would rather forgo honesty, reliability, and a good work ethic, and rather hire their own, in order that they can talk about immorality and other such subjects during lunch
יאיר לפיד בגימטריא = שמד
(that’s of course “with the kollel”, as he wants to destroy all kolleim)
Lapid is a faker he preaches the chariedim should go to work. But when a chariedi finds a job he sends his law enforcement and arrests the worker and the boss. The boss for ilegal providing a job and the worker for ilegal holding a job.
I agree with every word.
vuckovitcher,
wow that good (the gematria, in the margin of error)
Child-allowance payments, borrowed as an idea from Western countries, was never meant as assistance for poverty. It was meant as an incentive to have more children. Countries that later wanted to limit the population explosion curtailed the allowance.
Lapid is using the child-allowance to try to curb Chareidi and Arab reproduction. Whether it will work on the Arabs is unclear, maybe yes, maybe no. But on the Chareidim it certainly won’t work. But it will work on the secular or less-affiliated Israelis. And that result is the exact opposite of his goal, as the proportion of Chareidim to secular Israelis will only rise.
Lapid is demonstrating REPUBLICIAN POLICIES and trying to rid Israel of its socialist standing. He should first work on breaking up government monopolies and the high VAT & tax base.
Let’s stick to the facts, please.
1. In Israel, you are not permitted to work, unless you have fulfilled your obligation to the compulsory draft in the IDF.
2. Chareidim are fully aware of the fact that they will be harassed by their secular officers in the IDF, and exposed to women, singing in joint assembies or, heaven forbid, even worse.
3. In the newly-gender-integrated American army, the out-of-wedlock pregnancy rate is about 15%. There are 26,000 sexual harassment cases per year, including the head of the office who is supposed to prevent sexual harassment.
4. Young kids are not able wo withstand the ridicule and the pressure from their secular peers and officers, hence the statistic that even Hesder boys become alienated from Judaism in the IDF, at the rate of 50%.
So, Mr Lapid, we have a classical catch-22 situation–Chareidim are confronted with spiritual suicide if they join the IDF secular assimilation machine; if they don’t, and they try to go to work, they are treated like criminals. If they try to find refuge in the Yeshivot, you call them “parasites.”
Shame on you for such blatant demagoguery!
#17 4. Young kids are not able wo withstand the ridicule and the pressure from their secular peers and officers, hence the statistic that even Hesder boys become alienated from Judaism in the IDF, at the rate of 50%.”
COMPLETE LIES. WOOW. How do you claim to be Religious when you soo blatantly LIE like this? The seal of HKBH is EMET.
#17 – Do you just make up statistics on the spot? Hesder boys remain frum because they have a strong support system in place at home, in their community, in their yeshivas, and in their army units. Chareidi soldiers, on the other hand, who enter the mainstream army naturally have a more difficult time remaining frum. But remember, for decades, the Chareidi boys who entered the army were ALREADY headed off the derech…
No.8: Nothing in liberalism requires any hatred (or even mild dislike) of religion or the religious. And many religions, including the one that is the focus of this web site, require the kinds of things that liberalism calls for, like caring for the less fortunate, and humility. The arrogance of some liberals (e.g., Hillary Clinton, Anthony Weiner) is illiberal.