A poor man sifts through garbage in Jerusalem.
Photo: Ariel Jerozolimski
'Israel has highest poverty in the West'
By JPOST.COM STAFF
Oct 22, 2008 9:42 | Updated Oct 22, 2008 9:50
Israel has the highest poverty level in the western world, with one in four Israelis below the poverty line, according to an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) report.
According to the findings released Tuesday, poverty in Israel is 2.5 times the average in the developed world.
The report also stated that Israel's socioeconomic divide was the third highest, below Turkey and Mexico, and Israel was criticized by OECD for the failure of its fiscal policies to bridge the gap between the rich and poor.
On the whole, the OECD report found that economic growth of recent decades has benefited the rich more than the poor. In some countries, such as Canada, Finland, Germany, Italy, Norway and the United States, the gap also increased between the rich and the middle-class.
Launching the report in Paris, OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría said, "Growing inequality is divisive. It polarizes societies, it divides regions within countries, and it carves up the world between rich and poor. Greater income inequality stifles upward mobility between generations, making it harder for talented and hard-working people to get the rewards they deserve. Ignoring increasing inequality is not an option."
2 comments:
That story has somehow been excised from the JPost site. There are links to it that show up in a Google search, but they're all dead. And when you search for "poverty" using the JPost's search field, the article doesn't show up. Wonder if the editors decided it was a little too true to publish. Thanks for saving it, Steve.
Stefun; Israel is not a "religious state" but the state of the Jewish people, as France is for the French and Britain for the Brits..... as of the poverty it depends how the OECD is checking the issue. In Israel you consider a "poor" as one who earn about 5000 shekels a month (which is about 1700 US $). A "poor" in Israel means that you can't update your computer ability each year or have a trip to Europe or India, but you can eat and you have the minimum health insurance each citizen has, and you can live at your rented house. Only few of the few experiencing a lower live conditions, but they are protected by the government and non-government organizations which help them to pass the break and change course in life for finding a job and living in better conditions.
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