Diaspora Haredim Work, Israeli Haredim Don't – Why?

The haredi education system in London is private and very expensive. Therefore haredi men have no choice but to work if they want their children to attend haredi schools. In Israel, the state finances most of the system, so the men don't have to work in order for their children to attend haredi schools.  In Israel, taxpayer money is squandered on a school system that is separate, anti-Zionist, antidemocratic, that sometimes discriminates on ethnic grounds and that does not prepare its graduates for the modern labor market.

In London, as opposed to Israel, most Haredim go to work
Unlike in Israel, where taxpayer money is squandered on a separate school system for Haredim, British Haredim finance their private schools themselves.
By Meirav Arlosoroff • Ha'aretz

In 2005, Amiram Gonen of the Floersheimer Institute for Policy Studies examined the practices of London's ultra-Orthodox community. It has close ties to the Haredi community in Israel, and accepts the religious authority of rabbis in Israel. Nearly every Haredi lad in London is sent for "finishing" to an Israeli religious school. The community maintains its own education system, separate from the British state system.

Since these schools focus on religious studies (although the children learn other subjects as well ), they do not prepare their graduates for entering the modern job market. And because Haredi families in London tend to be very large, like their Israeli counterparts, the community is very poor.

But there is a vast difference between the two communities. In Israel, the majority of Haredi men study in yeshivas and don't work. In London, it's the opposite. Most Haredi men do work, even if their jobs are not particularly well-paid. An analysis by Hagay Levin of the Prime Minister's Office's National Economic Council, based on Gonen's research, found that 18% of Haredi men in London study in a yeshiva their entire lives. Most of these are the best students. But in Israel, the parallel percentage is between 60% and 75%.

Meaning that in Israel near all Haredi men, not only the best and brightest, turn yeshiva study into a vocation.

Levin's analysis names three reasons for this vast difference. One is army service: There is none in London, and here there is. Since the only way to evade conscription is to study at yeshiva (the Tal law ), in Israel all the Haredi men stay in school.

The second reason is welfare policy. Britain also cares for its poor, especially the large families among them. The birthrate in Britain is low, so it has an active policy of encouraging birth. But much of the support in Britain is conditional on finding work, for instance the negative income tax. The difference in help for people who work and those who don't is immense. That motivates them to work. In Israel, Haredim get most of their allowances whether they work or not. They do not have an incentive to work.

The third difference is education. While that of the London Haredim also emphasizes religious studies, most of their schools also include nonreligious subjects in the curriculum. In Israel, many of the Haredi boys' schools, especially at the high-school level, do not.

You want special treatment, you pay for it

This brings us to how Britain and Israel treat the separate Haredi education systems. Britain won't finance textbooks that aren't part of the official curriculum. It doesn't ban special schools with alternative curricula, but it won't finance them. You want special studies, you pay for them in a private school.

In Israel, the state finances the Haredi education system, to the tune of between 55% and 100%, though the schools don't use the official curriculum. They are not supervised, and they do not obey the state when it comes to safety, equality between students and workers' rights.

The two countries treat these separate education systems completely differently, and the fruits of each system are also completely different.

The fact that the Haredi education system in London is private makes it very expensive. Therefore Haredi men have no choice but to work if they want their children to attend the special schools.

In Israel, the state finances most of the system, so the men don't have to work in order for their children to attend the special schools.

The British system achieves two goals.

It preserves the principle of spending public money only on things that benefit the state. (It will only fund schools that empower citizens, including through their future inclusion in the workforce. )

In Israel, on the other hand, taxpayer money is squandered on a school system that is separate, anti-Zionist, antidemocratic, that sometimes discriminates on ethnic grounds and that does not prepare its graduates for the modern labor market.

[The British sytem] also forces those who use the separate education system to go to work, through the burden of high school fees. In Israel, the separate education system doesn't burden its consumers, who don't have to work: The ones paying for it are people who do not use it and who do work. The British Mandate may have had some positive aspects.

[Hat Tip: Shlomo.]

Comments

[David]

Its good to see the British haredim work. G-d doesn't like parasites. That's why you are meant to educate your children in such a manner that they can earn an income.

[harold]

So this is a problem that is largely due to Israeli policy.

If someone does not want to serve in the Army (nothing shameful here, I know I did not want to serve and go to Vietnam in my younger days) Israel allows an exemption if you stay in yeshiva, they couple it with not allowing one to work while in yeshiva and then they say that if you are in yeshiva and do not work then we will give you money.

The problem is not public support for education; it is a system that excludes people from being allowed to work.

The first policy to go is the one that doesn’t allow one to work while in yeshiva. One should always be allowed to work. Allow a military exemption if someone studies and gets smicha, allow one to attend yeshiva part time (and work) to get his smicha, set a maximum time to allow to get the smicha. Support should only be given to supplement someone who is married and only while they are in the smicha/work track and for two years following getting smicha if one attends some form of vocational school. There should be no support after that.

[Barry]

Of course to allow Hareidim to handle scissors let alone modern weaponary would be as big a mistake for Israel as the arming of Afgan religious fanatics was to the USA and Pakistan. Israel must aim to repeat the conditions in early 20th century Europe and the USA which resulted in Haredism being abandoned by a large proportion of backward Jews. Israel must not allow itself to be exploited by the Hareidim. It can only do that by allowing the Hareidim to suffer the consequences of their backwardness. They need to understand that what they call education is nothing but superstition and that it inevitably leads to extreme poverty. Of course that will mean that the most fanatical of Hareidim who refuse to change will like those in 'the Heim' die in their early thirties and will bury half their children however this pressure will make a far larger number see reason and abandon their pre modern backwardness and become productive members of society. Remember the majority of Jews in the USA today are descended from those who escaped Hariedi backwardness in Europe. Harold would want you to believe that Haridism is an immovable force but history shows that when confronted with reality it is a paper tiger. Israel's only duty is to help Hareidim escape their backwardness not to strengthen it. It is not shameful to provide the necessary 'tough love' of allowing Hareidi suffering and even death brought about as a consequence of their own backwardness if the price of doing so might even be higher for the secular majority. You have to save the host even at the cost of the parasite.

[jonadar]

barry youre great, beutifully wrote piece your said it exactly the way it is and should be

[Jay]

MO yeshiva students go into military service, religious zionist yeshiva students do military service. There is no reason whatsoever to create any sort of exemption or deferment simply because someone happens to be Haredi.

[Yochanan Lavie]

We Can't Work at All
Apologies to the Beatles

Try to see it our way,
Do I have to keep on rioting till I can't go on?
While you see it your way,
Run the risk of knowing that our Torah may be gone.

Chorus:

We can't work at all,
We can't work at all.

Think of what we're saying.
We think you're wrong and still we think that we're all right.
Think of what I'm saying,
We can work a job and get it straight, or have a fight.

Chorus

Life is very short, but there is time
For fussing and fighting, chiloni.
I have always thought that work's a crime,
So I will ask you for money.

Try to see it my way,
Rabbis will tell that I am right and you are wrong.
While you see it your way
There's a chance that Torah will fall apart before too long.

Chorus

Life is very short, but there's some time
For political fighting, in Knesset.
I have always thought that work's a crime,
So I will ask you to confess it.

Better see it my way,
Rabbis will tell that I am right and you are wrong.
While to see it your way
The coalition will fall apart before too long.

Chorus.

[Bill]

Barry,

Brilliant!

[A. Nuran]

YL that one and the "Years and Years and Years" were brilliant.

Likewise, Barry.

[harold]

It is not shameful to provide the necessary 'tough love' of allowing Hareidi suffering and even death

How absolutely sick!

[Yochanan Lavie]

Thank you, AN.

[Barry]

Harold, why are you so sickened?

It's not that I am suggesting that Hareidim be put before a firing squad as suggested by the Slonim Rebbe. All I wish to see is the Hareidim suffer the consequences of their OWN actions. It is something every healthy society has to go through.

[Dovy]

Nice job, Yochanon!

[who knows]

Harold, by you it is Ok for non-Haredi to die in war defending Haredim, while Haredim avoid service (who want to serve anyway? even you did not want to serve).

Then Haredim want to recieve money from the working widows of non-Haredim who fell in wars protecting the Haredim.

This is Ok and moral by you Harold, but I fail to see shining moral light of your position.

[Yochanan Lavie]

Thanks Dovy.

[Yochanan Lavie]

Another Beatles Parody:

It's been a hareidi day's night, and I've been learning my gemara
It's been a hareidi day's night, I should be sleeping like a schnorrer
When I milk secular Jews I find the things that they do
Will make me feel uptight

I don't work all day to get you money to buy a thing
And it's worth it just to hear them say they're gonna give me everything
So why on earth should I schrei, 'cause when I eat matzoh brei
You know I feel okay
When I'm learning everything seems to be right
When I'm shirking, taking the money is tight,tight,nu
It's been a hareidi day's night, and I've been learning my gemara
It's been a hareidi day's night, I should be sleeping like a schnorrer
But as a superior Jew,I find the things that I do
Will make me feel upright

Oy!

But when I milk secular Jews, I find the things they do
Will make me feel uptight
On the dole, everything seems to be right
On the dole, feeding me money is tight, all through the night, nu.

It's been a hareidi day's night, and I've been learning like a lamdan
It's been a hareidi day's night, I should be as wise as the Rambam
When I get home to Bnei Brak, I find the people in black
Will make me feel self-righteous
You know I feel self-righteous
You know I feel self-righteous...

[harold]

Harold, by you it is Ok for non-Haredi to die in war defending Haredim, while Haredim avoid service

How absurd, I never said, nor would any say that it is Ok for non-Haredi to die in war. The government set up a deferral system that has an undesired consequence of creating a group of professional schnorers. I am simply trying to suggest a system to back out of this fiasco in a timely and logical fashion.

[danny]

YL. I'm in awe of your special talent. I love the Beatles and always have some form of music playing in my mental ipod.

[Abracadabra]

Yochanan -

You're stuff is GREAT!!!

You should put your stuff onto your own blog. Seriously - you'd get tons of hits and grow a whole fan club!

Or you can publish it in a newspaper of some sort. The Forward? The Jewish Week? The English version of Haaretz or YNet? You can have a weekly column with your song parady of the week!

Well, I'm just glad you share it with us - it's great entertainment and a lot of fun. Thanks!

[chief doofis]

Many Haredim in the US do not get any secular education either. Most Chassidc schools give boys the barest minimum through seventh grade and nothing beyond that. Many Lakewood "high Schools" have no secular studies dep't at all. (girls do get schooling, albeit a weak one). Perhaps the British Jews are a little different.

[Nigel]

If London's haredim earn so little yet school fees are so high and there is no government subsidy for haredi schools, how do London's poorly paid haredim afford to pay the high school fees? And please do not tell me it is down to negative tax, because that would not cover the high rents, high school fees, high food prices (triple the price for kosher), etc, etc. The figures simply do not add up.

Just like in Israel, I suspect that a few wealthy community philanthropists and collective donations heavily subsidise the education of the majority. And aren't haredi schools starting to integrate, especially the girls schools?

This article claims a reality that simply does not exist. Both communities are poor. Both are heavily subsidised by private sector philanthropy and fund-raising. The key difference is the numbers of adult men the community's coffers can support in full-time kollel learning.

And unfortunately, in Israel the job outlook for haredim is little to no better. It is increasingly documented how haredim that train for professional careers are unable to gain jobs with secular employers, ie, secular employers, which are the vast majority, are prejudiced against haredim. And sadly, there is probably more anti-haredi feeling in Israel than in London. And you wonder why haredim aren't integrated?

Israel isn't even a workers' paradise for Modern Orthodox Jews, as Shabbat keepers also face a lot of prejudice. Fact is that Orthodox Jews face increasing employment problems in an increasingly 24/7 economy. And visible Jews, ie, those who dress Jewishly, find it especially difficult to find work.

Both the Diaspora and a secular Israel push Orthodox Jews away, Equal opportunity does not exist. Before you demand haredim serve in the army or undertake public service, first welcome them into society. Just because the Modern Orthodox are willing to serve without receiving equal opportunities doesn't mean you can demand the same from haredim, whose suspicions of Labor Zionists have been proven time and time again to be well-founded, arguably increasingly so.

And how about getting equally upset with all the draft-dodging secularists, including those who effectively declare themselves anarchists to avoid being drafted? There's more than one brand of Zionism and more than one type of anti-Zionist!