In a public address last night on Israel’s economic problems, Prof. Marcus Arkin, director general of the South African Zionist Federation, argued that “without a doubt, Israel’s most critical current burden is rampant inflation, which has assumed South American proportions.”
After analyzing the circumstances which have given rise to a situation in which “the specter of inflation now permeates all aspects of Israeli life and must be regarded on a par with the rejectionist Arab front as a threat to the very fabric of the Jewish State, “Arkin concluded on a more hopeful note:
“Currency reform, a curb on the printing (money) presses, limiting costs of living increments only to those in the very lowest income brackets, manpower redeployment coupled with arbitration procedures to settle wage disputes without stoppages and a more efficient tax administration make up the ingredients of a formula which would lay the Frankenstein monster once and for all to rest.”
Arkin was formerly head of the department of economics and dean of the social science faculty of Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa.
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