For all those who think chareidim in Eretz Yisroel have made themselves “deliberately poor,” have you ever set foot in Israel? My husband and I both work multiple jobs and cannot make ends meet. We do not have a car or own an apartment or overspend on luxuries of any sort. (Unless you are calling an internet connection which we need for some of our jobs a luxury?) Do you have any idea what average salaries are here or how much we pay in taxes? Lapid/Lipman’s gezeiros include a huge cut in the child allowance, increased income taxes, extra taxes on food, including produce, and huge cuts in support for all the charedi schools and yeshivos. The government here is enacting gezeira after gezeira against the charedi community and against all lower income Israelis (which is most Israelis). I recently saw a letter a chiloni man wrote to Lapid saying how much the cut in child allowances would hurt his family. I am fine with canceling the child allowances altogether–if they can make it possible to earn a decent living wage in this country and stop taxing us to death on our income/living space/food/all basic services/etc. As it is, this is one of multiple blows raining down on us from all sides and there is nothing deserved or productive about the whole miserable package. It was also emblematic that the cuts took effect right before the chagim. Some yom tov present.
Menu