National poverty is worse in Israel than in the 34 other member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a report issued on Wednesday by the organization revealed. According to the data, which applied to 2010, 20.9 percent of Israelis live below the poverty line.
In Israel, a family is defined as poor when the combined household income is less than 4,000 shekels (approximately $1,100). The poverty rate in Israel jumped from 13.8% in 1995 to 20.9% in 2010, according to the OECD report.
One of the main reasons for Israel's relatively high poverty rate was because significant parts of the ultra-Orthodox and Arab sectors remain outside the workforce. These sectors also have relatively high birthrates compared to the population sectors who are active in the workforce.
Responding to the OECD report in an interview with Israel Radio on Thursday, Finance Minister Yair Lapid said that the answer to poverty was not continued handouts but employment. Regarding the massive cuts to government spending Lapid is instituting in next year's national budget, Lapid told Army Radio that even before the elections, he knew Israel had a "massive budget deficit" to the tune of some 35 billion shekels ($9.6 billion).
Israel ranked fifth among OECD nations in unequal income distribution between the wealthy and poor. The equitable distribution of wealth was worse only in Chile, Mexico, Turkey and the United States.
Welfare and Social Services Minister Meir Cohen (Yesh Atid) said in response to the report: "We have no doubt that the steady rise in poverty in Israel over the last eight years shows the need for fundamental change. Poverty is an existential threat of the highest order, and so we must address it."
Eran Weintraub, who chairs the humanitarian aid organization LATET, said the government must find new ways to combat the nation's poverty, which he called a "national emergency."
"We call on the new government to formulate a national emergency program immediately to attend to the issue of poverty," Weintrub said.
Opposition Leader MK Shelly Yachimovich (Labor) said fighting poverty was on par with tackling inflation and the nation's budget deficit.
"Lowering the number of poor people is a national goal, which must be measured and wrestled with no less than inflation or the [state] deficit," said Yachimovich.
Labor faction chairman MK Isaac Herzog, who served as welfare and social services minister from March 2007 to January 2011, warned that "Israel is headed toward social disaster."
Labor MK Itzik Shmuli, who was National Student Union chairman before being elected to the Knesset, said that Israel's figures were the "results of a failed state."
Other figures released on Wednesday showed that France -- Europe's second largest economy -- is slipping into a recession.
The Eurostat figures recorded a slump of 0.2% in the French economy in the first quarter of this year. This was the second consecutive quarter that France showed negative growth, meaning that the country's economy was essentially in recession.
Germany showed slower than expected growth as well. The largest European economy grew by only 0.1% in the first quarter of 2013, which was less than the 0.3% that economic forecasters had predicted.
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