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Director General of the National Insurance Institute: It is no longer possible to cut child benefits for the ultra-Orthodox

Meir Spiegler fires in all directions: for those who have no justifiable reason not to return to work - unemployment benefits should be stopped.

Shaul Meridor opposed giving unemployment to those who work even one hour a month.

Senior officials are not part of the people, they must connect.

And there is also a tough forecast: the market will not return to what it was before the Korna

Tags

• Social Security

• Meir Spiegler

• Chalat

• Corona

• religious

• pension

Sonia Gorodisky and Maya Horodnichano

Monday, 22 March 2021, 08:22 Updated: 11:35

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The corona year made Social Security CEO

Meir Spiegler

one of the key figures in the economic management of the crisis. Decision-makers including the finance minister and the prime minister called him more than once to consult on unemployment assistance programs and he himself was behind some of the initiatives.

Spiegler (62) eight. For the position by former Minister of Welfare MK Haim Katz, he never imagined that this would be the fourth year of his tenure.

In March last year, the number of new unemployment benefits jumped from 8,500 in two weeks to close to a million.

Despite the many challenges that lay ahead, Spiegler was pleased with the functioning of Social Security and convinced that it should be turned into an independent body.

He has a full stomach for the functioning of the budget department, especially at the beginning of the crisis, he thinks it is in the state's interest to include as many ultra-Orthodox and minorities in the employment circle, but in the same breath he suggests not touching child benefits "Where else will they cut it?"

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"The market will not be what it used to be"

Spiegler is very careful not to get into political issues, but heaps compliments on the functioning of the sovereign in the corona crisis on the decisions that are "imitated in the world."

What do you recommend the government do to end the application program at the end of June?

"Assistance should be channeled to those who really need it - balance the desire to get as many workers back into work and at the same time not forget those who could not find work, for many reasons, including Their age, they should also be taken care of, so that they do not reach the state of a piece of bread.

After all, everyone worked before the crisis, no one wanted the crisis to escape the labor market.

"There are quite a few people aged 50 and over who are begging to go back to work, they are sending resumes endlessly, and they are not succeeding. And there are very successful people who want to go back to work, they do not want to sit idle at home"

"In situations that justify it, must continue to support it A population that will do its best to return to the labor market and it will not succeed. They should be honest and say - the market will not return to the way it was, it will shrink. Businesses will become more efficient, they will try to make better use of existing labor and reduce their workforce. They say it in a wavy brush. "

Who can survive on unemployment benefits?

(Photo: Yoav Itiel)

"Who can survive on these sums?"

So how will you deal with about 400,000 unemployed who will remain according to estimates after June (compared to about 200 before it).

What is the main thing the new government needs to do?

"Bringing the economy back to full activity as soon as possible, with job creation, vocational training, all those components that are supposed to make the continuation come back to itself and even develop beyond that.

Regarding training, Spiegler says:" At this level, in my humble opinion, a long time ago.

Even if they did not know when the crisis would end, but at some point they already knew that he was not going to leave us so quickly. "

Spiegler also notes that" unemployment benefits are not wages.

They significantly change a person's ability to function economically.

Say it's 70%, I tell you it's not 70%, not at all.

It's less.

The average unemployment benefit in this economy is 4,700 per month.

Who can survive on these sums?

Let's put things in proportion.

This is not a response to wages deducted from you. "

Would you bring forward the end of unemployment benefits from June to April / May? The situation now greatly slows the rate of return to the labor force.

" Let's be honest.

Even before the Corona there was a problem of manpower in certain industries - in hotels and restaurants.

These are mostly casual jobs.

When starting a business, they immediately need a large number of employees.

It should also be remembered that people have been out of the employment circle for many months, they have become accustomed to a certain life span, they need a time span of getting organized.

This business will eventually reach equilibrium. "

"Even before the Corona, there was a problem of manpower in hotels and restaurants" (Photo: Reuven Castro)

"Shaul Meridor did not want to hear"

However, Spiegler adds: "The people who are in the Knesset and will be offered to return to work on similar terms to those they had before and will not have a justifiable reason not to return to work should stop their unemployment benefits."

Are you satisfied with the decision to extend the Knesset until the end of June?

We did not anticipate the third closure.

In August we recommended extending the holiday to the end of October because of the Tishrei holidays and then re-evaluating things. On the one hand, make sure people know that tomorrow they will not run out of unemployment benefits, that they go through the holidays safely, and on the other hand, we tried not to be too long. So the decision was made differently, we do not always just accept our opinion.

Why did you not switch to the German model - flexible challah?

"In March last year we unusually pressed to give the unemployed the opportunity to work part-time. But they did not want to. We are attentive to the public and approached us with such requests. For example, the owner of a moving company approached me. Tells me: 'Meir, I do not have enough orders to employ full-time workers. But I have a part-time job. Give my employees unemployment benefits for some of the jobs they do not work for me, and I will pay them for a part-time job that they will work for me. It is natural, it is logical, it is realistic, but the unemployment law says if he worked one hour a month. Can not get unemployment benefits "

" I went to the budget department and told them that we are in a crisis, must allow it, but they did not want to hear it, Saul Meridor did not want. Now that has changed and from November let people work part time and get a grant along with this salary It would cost them more if they only received unemployment benefits. "

And how many people have actually implemented it and returned to working part-time since November?

Out of 339,000 in potential only 20,000 approached us and started working part time.

This mechanism was too complex because the budget department are experts without doing simple things, their outline is so complex that people are already saying 'leave me alone, do not want anything from you'.

Why is it impossible to do understandable things?

"You opposed the plan that was approved to return to the incentive for the veteran unemployed, and the Ministry of Finance thinks it is an excellent plan."

About Shaul Meridor: "The budget department did not want to hear" (Photo: Flash 90, Yonatan Zindel, Flash 90)

"Before he becomes part of the people"

Spiegler, it seems, has a full stomach for finance officials.

Even when things are not stated explicitly, they shout from the lines:

"We wanted to give no more than NIS 1,500 in the first and fourth months, we wanted the full unemployment benefits in those months beyond wages. Because of the Ministry of Finance's legal adviser it is not before. "It's not just numbers, economics is psychology. The finance minister was with me unequivocally here before the election, but the system has its limitations."

Even after three senior executives left the Ministry of Finance?

"Our cooperation with the Ministry of Finance is better than it was before. But they still have a pattern of conduct, an internal organizational culture of taking academia and bringing it into the lap of the Ministry of Finance. I think when appointing a senior to a senior position that affects the general public, "There will be a threshold condition of being out of the public system for a few years, that he will see the real life of the citizens, then he will come back and make decisions, but first he will be part of the people."

"Life is not higher education, life is a different reality. I am also an academy graduate, and I have some degrees, but I was 42 until I was out of the public system, I am part of the general public, I am not in the ivory tower. There is a limit."

Why were the Treasury so opposed at the beginning of the crisis to the flexible application model?

”They had a thesis that the people would take advantage of it.

I told them that most people are decent, clean-handed people who worked before the crisis.

They stopped working just because their jobs were closed to them.

I told them then that even if there are a few percent who will be abused, calm down, there is a limit to everything.

It is impossible to generalize because of the little about the rule. "

"It cannot be that the taxpayer's money will depend on the decisions of the budget department in the Treasury" (Photo: Reuven Castro)

Has the corona not further strengthened the understanding that complete independence is needed for Social Security?

"We thought about it until before the corona. On September 12, 2018 there was no corona, so we raised unequivocal demands for the independence of the management and functioning of the Social Security. Disengage from the budget department. It can not be that taxpayers' money depends on budget department decisions. . can not be".

"Social Security money regularly moves to the state budget, which at least for most of the years was deficit in the first place, which in fact reduces the deficit. Former Welfare Minister Haim Katz, before leaving office, gave Social Security all the backing in its struggle for administrative, functional and financial independence." .

Spiegler repeat: "the ability of the social security will be better as the NII will be more independent and beams proved to the world what social security must be an independent body that serves the public when it comes to his social security".

Vaccines for corona in Europe.

They also distributed grants to the entire population (Photo: Reuters)

"Trump also distributed grants"

Alongside the criticism, it is important for Spiegler to sound balanced in his remarks and he adds: "It should be said that the sovereign was properly managed in the corona crisis, understood the magnitude of the hour. We were the catalyst, we energized them, we pushed them. We were exposed to things Decisions that we naturally supported. Decisions that are imitating us in the world today. Throughout the crisis, Minister of Finance Israel Katz saw things face to face with the National Insurance Institute. "

What do you think about the grant programs for every citizen?

" We supported the grant programs because we saw on a professional basis that This is required.

Because unemployment benefits are not wages.

People have needs, have mortgages and children’s classes.

At the beginning of the crisis, the Ministry of Finance and the Prime Minister's Office actually wanted to give grants differentially, according to the level of income, but then the system did not know how to give grants based on categories and develop a system that takes time.

The sovereign wanted to do it quickly, but immediately we could not. "

Spiegler adds that he himself supported providing grants to every citizen up to a certain income level:" We worked very hard, and developed the system to allow decision makers to follow our professional path.

Today we can do anything.

We internalized things and got organized.

"" Even before he left, Trump distributed grants to everyone without weight and without a differential parameter.

In Europe they do that.

Here they criticize it like this because we are the Jewish people (laughs).

Now Biden is giving $ 1.9 trillion in aid.

It was precisely here that they saw the future to come and before the rest of the Western world understood that we must open our hands, expand aid and give people the minimum in order for them to survive. "

"It is in the interest of the state to increase the share of the ultra-Orthodox in the labor market."

An ultra-Orthodox demonstration in Jerusalem (Photo: Flash 90, Noam Rivkin Fenton)

On life expectancy and ultra-Orthodox

Are you not worried that the increase in the populations among them is that quite a few enjoy a social security benefit but do not participate in the labor force?

There is a double time bomb here: the general population is also prolonging life, and welfare populations are also growing.

"Life expectancy is rising meteorically. And we're in favor of raising the retirement age. We've been saying this since 2018. I wanted to raise the retirement age for men and women to the age of 70, which is now being done all over the Western world, and abrasive professions especially for women. ".

"It is in the interest of the state to increase as much as possible the share of the ultra-Orthodox in the labor market. I once taught the ultra-Orthodox business administration, they are guys with a motivation that it definitely deserves to get the most out of. They should just be encouraged to enter the labor market. The ultra-Orthodox are entering the labor market because they understand that in the end it is necessary to both earn a living and improve their standard of living. "

"But I am not the sovereign. Our professional opinion is unequivocal - to spur and encourage as many ultra-Orthodox men as possible and as many people in populations that do not participate in high percentages in the labor market do increase their share of the morning work. It will only do good to everyone without exception."

"It is better that they do not give anything"

Despite the desire to increase the participation of the ultra-Orthodox sector in the labor market, Spiegler opposes cuts in child benefits, which many believe constitute an incentive not to work.

There are parties that are talking today about cutting child benefits, what do you think about that?

"The child allowances were cut very significantly in the early 2000s. Today, everyone receives the same amount of NIS 157 per child. That's a little bit. Where will they cut it? It's better that they don't give anything than that they cut it. There is a limit."

How do you assess the functioning of the Social Security system in a crisis?

"I do not want to pat on the back. But I want to say that the Social Security immediately understood the magnitude of the hour, that they became not just public servants but public messengers. And that if they did not do what was asked, people would crash. At the beginning of the crisis Social Security people worked "From six in the morning to 10 at night. On holidays, on Friday evenings. I walked around the branches a lot and saw. We made dozens of changes to our systems, it has no equal in the public service. And it must be said that for all the changes we made we received full indemnification from the Ministry of Finance.

"Before the corona in the first half of the month, we would have handled about 8,500 unemployment benefit claims. In the first closure in the first half of the month, we received close to a million claims, 118 times."

Filling out unemployment forms in Haifa.

"We hope that after the election there will be a change" (Photo: Yoav Itiel)

"Income security does not allow for survival"

The National Insurance Institute said that the number of recipients of income support jumped by about 30% during the corona period - from 70,600 at the beginning of 2020 to about 90,130 last December.

Experts estimate that the number of income support claimants will increase after the reductions in entitlement to unemployment benefits are stopped.

An income support pension is supposed to guarantee a minimum subsistence allowance for those who cannot find work or are unable to work, but while there has been a reduction in entitlement to unemployment benefits, the conditions for entitlement to a benefit allowance have remained difficult and the benefit amount extremely low.

For example, an individual who is found eligible will receive between NIS 1,400 and 2,200, depending on age, and a couple with two children, between NIS 2,949 and NIS 4,480, depending on age.

An amount that does not allow for basic subsistence.

Last week, Tel Aviv District Judge Michal Agmon Gonen also criticized the state for not compiling an index for living with dignity, explaining that the allowances are not necessarily sufficient.

"The state has not yet defined a measure of subsistence with dignity, according to which the adequacy of the various benefits received to meet the threshold of minimum subsistence with dignity will be examined," she wrote in her decision.

According to Spiegler, "This promise (income guarantee) is certainly not appropriate, it is very small, does not allow those who receive it to survive financially. This is true of senior citizen pension, it is true of income supplement (senior citizens), regarding income guarantee and alimony. And we We always said that this thing must change, it is committed to reality. "

He points out that the National Insurance Institute is calling for a long time to increase the allowances and research they conducted regarding the subsistence allowance required to live with dignity - the amounts are thousands of shekels more than the allowances today.

"These are benefits that the government system is obligated to change and give a solution that will not let people live from hand to mouth," he says, adding that "they think there are benefits that are mandatory, necessary, revised and changed, and raised to give people the minimum opportunity to live with dignity."

How much attentive ear do you get when it comes to the lower class and benefits?

"We say things and they are heard, but have not yet been put into practice. Hopefully after this election there will be a change," he replies, adding that "we will certainly not let go, act on the issue. This is in the minds of those who will make decisions."

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