Israel's Inequality

Just 18 families in Israel control roughly 60 percent of the equity value of all companies in Israel according to this economist .

Of course, there are other rich people in Israel who control much of the other 40 percent. Israel is the most unequal country in the developed world, second only to the United States. In the year 2009, Israel bypassed Mexico for the first time as more unequal. In 1965 there was a survey of all countries in the world in terms of equality, and Israel was ranked between the Netherlands and Finland—one of the most equal countries in the world. Today, Israel is one of the most unequal countries in the world.

Because Israel spends so much on security and the military Israel actually spends about 75 percent less, in ratio comparisons with OECD countries on health care and unemployment benefits and such like. In 2002 the chairman of the Manufacturers Association in Israel said that because of the struggle with the Palestinians, because of the intifada, Israelis have to learn that they cannot expect an increase in the minimum wage, or perhaps even they should expect a decrease in the minimum wage, meaning that the security constraints are used as a justification to stifle social struggle.

Socialists have always argued that the workers of all countries have more in common with each other than with those representing the interests of capital. Zionism hasn’t established a workers’ paradise. The sole fruit of the decades of strife which Zionism has known has been the establishment of yet another capitalist state - an achievement the workers of the world, Jewish or otherwise , could well have done without. The tragedy is that Israeli workers take sides in this struggle instead of organising for socialism.

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