Ben Aharon Says Israel’s Economy is Geared to Help the Rich Get Richer

Yitzhak Ben Aharon, secretary general of Histadrut, delivered a slashing attack on Israel’s economic policies last night which he charged were polarizing the nation between rich and poor. The Histadrut leader, a controversial figure in the Labor Party leadership because of his outspoken dovish views on the matter of future borders, claimed that the current economic policy, “guided by one or two persons” had produced “socialism in reverse by expropriating public funds for the enrichment of a few.”

Ben Aharon addressed a Labor Party faction known as “Etgar” (Challenge) which includes many former senior Army officers. One of his main targets was Finance Minister Pinhas Sapir, the acknowledged architect of Israel’s economic policies. Sapir later refused to comment on Ben Aharon’s remarks.

The union leader claimed that the government’s economic policies “endanger our very existence.” He said: “We are living in an unreal situation created out of Hollywood. Our living standards are based on funds mobilized to buy Phantoms and to absorb immigrants and those close to the coffers get rich. Public money gets wasted and the nouveau riche wax fatter, like cancer in the national bloodstream.”

SOCIALISM AND CAPITALISM CANNOT CO-EXIST

Ben Aharon said it was a “disgrace to the nation” that 60-70,000 families live in poverty and 30-40,000 boys and girls are “wasting away on the fringe of our society in Musrara (a Jerusalem slum) and in Beisan and Hatzar (two new immigrant townships)” He demanded that his party decide whether it wants a capitalist, acquisitive society or socialism. “There can be no co-existence,” he declared.

He conceded that there must be a pluralistic economy. But what we have today is the reverse of socialist Zionism, he contended. “We need a planned and guided economy with a ceiling on what people may earn,” he said Ben Aharon also conceded that the living standards of Israeli workers have been raised significantly, but, he added. “If there is to be a controlled wage policy there must be a controlled income policy.” He criticized the Bank of Israel for publishing a yearly study of the increased purchasing power of wages in Israel but never an annual report on profit margins. He warned that Israel would cease to attract immigrants if it became “only a provincial copy of American or European society.”

Asked by a questioner why he stressed the dark spots, Ben Aharon replied, referring to Sapir, “There is a man who produces his black notebook and reads out interesting numbers on achievements which are not to be underestimated. But I came here to focus attention on those, dark spots that I think must be remedied.” Ben Aharon said that “if my views are not those of our movement, then I should not represent it.”