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Social Change, Every Which Way
By Rabbi Jill Jacobs / April 29, 2009
I recently returned from a whirlwind, thirty-two hour tour of LA, during which I spoke with students and faculty of
Even those of us who may take part in multiple means of social change often find ourselves debating the relative merits of various modes of change: people devoted to organizing and advocacy look down at those doing service for focusing only on the immediate need, without trying to solve the problem in the long run; people who do service dismiss organizing as too slow to address current issues; those who do hands-on work find check-writing too passive; those who focus on tzedakah point out that most organizations need money more than volunteers. And on and on.
There is, of course, no answer to this endless debate. Without organizing, the most passionate speeches will do little good; without these passionate speeches, few will feel moved to action. Without policy change, we will never end hunger, homelessness, or exploitatio; without direct service, people will go hungry and without shelter until policies change.
I decided to name my book There Shall be No Needy because I wanted a name that was aspirational. I wanted to push us, as a community, to think broadly about our responsibility to create a world without poverty or other forms of suffering. But those who recognize the biblical reference will remember that, in the book of Deuteronomy, God makes this promise–that there will be no needy in the land, and almost immediately follows up with a warning to give tzedakah when asked, as the poor will never disappear.Â
I read this apparent contradiction as a challenge to maintain our focus both on the long-term goal, and on the short-term alleviation of suffering. If we put all of our efforts toward policy change, people will starve while we negotiate politics. If we put all of our efforts toward meeting immediate needs, we will never achieve a more just world.Â
A friend of mine, also a rabbi, tells the story of taking a group of high school students to volunteer at a homeless shelter. At the end of the evening, one of the students turned to him and said, "this was such a fantastic experience! Every kid should get to volunteer at a homeless shelter."Â
When we become so focused on either meeting the immediate needs of a homeless person, or on our own feeling of self-fulfillment through teh volunteer experience, we have lost sight of the promise that "there shall be no needy" and of the obligation to work toward this ideal. On the other hand, when we turn down our noses at service as providing only a band-aid solution, we ignore the second part of the biblical text, which reminds us to care for each and every person who asks for help.
What’s the best way to create social change? An impossible question to answer–we might have to start by doing everything.
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MacrocompassionÂ
On Social Change, a comment on Rabbi Jill Jacobs Awareness for TIKUN.
Have you any idea what its like to be poor? So poor that you don’t have enough food for your starving kids and for heating in the middle of winter? Not all poor families are as poor as that, although here in Israel it may shock you to learn that about 25% of our school children do not go to school with adequate foord for their mid-morning break. You can argue about if you like but in common with many other "civilized" countries there are many poor families and the proportions of them are growing and more importantly, the amount of subsidence they are recieving is not ever going to be enough. Indeed this kind of tempory solution is failing and to even think about a more serious permanent solution seems to be some sort of far-off pipe-dream.Â
Yet this is what I wish to write about and it applies to communities in many other parts of the world, almost certainly including yours too. So please bear with me and read the following article by none other than myself.
THE SOLUTION TO OUR WIDENING POVERTY/RICHES GAPÂ
 The greatest social problem that we in Israel are experiencing today is the growing difference between the poor and the rich. This is not a new problem and for that reason we have learned to accept it. But we do this at a terrible cost in separation (and the associated feelings of anger, depression and helplessness), between the people who have jobs that provide stable incomes with comfortable homes and those who don’t and can’t. As a serious person whose charitable thoughts extend beyond his donating power, the writer refuses to accept this situation. And he should probably be labeled as slightly crazy, considering what he is going to explain below. This is because there really is a practical solution to this problem.Â
It doesn’t appear that our government has made much progress in easing this injustice, although it can’t be denied that many changes have recently taken place. Current figures of unemployment exceed 8% and the growing numbers of families below the "poverty line" imply that things are getting worse. (Its bad enough that 25% of our school children are reported as going to their classes hungry, without taking with them sufficient food). These unhappy disclosures come with the bitter news (for the poor that is) that the shares market is now recovering and it is a good time to invest! Much lip service is paid to the dire need to "create" more jobs, whilst less public money is being spent and more civil servants are being sacked.
 Let us recognize that this is a national problem of macroeconomic proportions, and the approach to it must be by understanding how our economy works in the technical sense, without politics being involved. Due to what seems to be a complex situation, our macroeconomic system is a subject about which few people can speak with conviction. However, there is a rational way of thinking about it, and to really understand my explanation of how our macro-economy operates is simultaneously to (joyfully) discover the solution to our problem of joblessness. Possibly due to doubts about the theory that follows, you may need some time to digest it, before the coin drops. But there is hope, an answer is to be found out there! Â
The writer’s quest for this answer is coldly logical and extremely basic. It begins by examining the difference between micro- and macroeconomics. We are most familiar with microeconomics, which is on a family or company level. The decisions are made without taking into account how they affect the community at large. Indeed there is no need to do so, when our needs are of a personal or local nature. However, what is good for the individual is very different to what is good for the whole country.
 Macroeconomics on the other hand, takes into account the "big picture" and is able to examine how national policies affect the average of the whole population. Because it deals with this average it cannot envisage how single families, firms or even small sectors of the population are affected. It is insensitive as to whether there are lots of slightly impoverished people or a smaller number of very poor ones. This is because after including the richer ones, their average is the same in both cases. However, when everyone is doing badly, a macroeconomic approach is able to show that something is wrong. Also it can illustrate how the different macro-economic functions of society are combined. This is the means that we shall be using, to understand what is actually happening in Israel (and elsewhere too).Â
Most people (including the writer) have difficulty in determining whether a particular aspect of the subject is a micro- or macro- one. This dilemma explains why the experts are unable to agree, for they are always mixing up these two conceptions. As an example, from a microeconomic aspect personal taxation is regarded as a bad thing and we would cheerfully manage a lot better without it. However as responsible citizens who can also appreciate taxation from a national macroeconomic viewpoint, we know that it is necessary. In fact from this position, the more tax that is collected the better (provided that we don’t have to pay it ourselves!). Below the explanation uses only macroeconomic concepts, and it shows that what we actually have is a simple situation, when of necessity it is examined from sufficiently great a distance. The writer should explain why he wrote "simple" here.
Scientists and engineers have found that they can describe a large population (of molecules, say) by their averages. In a sealed jar containing a specific quantity of gas, the average pressure, density and temperature are related and can be found without having to trace the rapid movements of any of the millions of molecules within. By calculation we can determine whether there will be an explosion or implosion when the seal is broken. The quantity of gas and its average properties have been reduced to a simple concept and we can decide what will happen without regard to the individual molecule. The same situation applies when the macroeconomic properties of the whole national population are considered and what was previously thought to be very complicated now becomes relatively simple, provided that it is the average that is being examined. Within the macroeconomic system, to produce goods and services the managers bring together three different kinds of basic elements or factors of production. These are commonly known as the land, labor and capital. (There are some economists who claim that an additional factor is technology, but since this can be purchased as a service it really falls within the above classifications as either capital or labor.) The returns paid for use of these factors are called the ground-rents, wages and interest (or dividend), respectively. These costs are covered during the simultaneous employment of the factors of production. When one of these three elements is in short supply, the product becomes more expensive due to the increased return payment being made for its use.
 Initially in a "new" country, there is an abundance of land but the pioneers are limited in their productive capacity by the scarcely of their numbers. Everybody works hard, but if one farmer needs to dig up a tree-root or to shift a heavy rock, he needs the assistance of many others. So the first limitation is in labor and anybody having a few slaves for hire is a king.  A little village springs up. There are now sufficient people to perform the more difficult kinds of farming activities. However there is only one tractor and a few plows and straggly draft-animals, which are needed in half a dozen places at once during the plowing and planting season. The tractor owner is now the one who gets rich, due to the heavy demand for his services. So the current limitation is in capital. Until the farmers are able to produce sufficient goods and to be able to exchange part of them for more powerful tools and better equipment, the community will remain relatively poor. Employment is not a problem in this society, anyone who is not busy in the fields or in raising domestic animals, is building himself a better house, enclosing a larger paddock or improving on his working gear. The community grows into a small town. There is no longer a problem of insufficient manpower or equipment. The problem is one of finding suitable space for the newly established farms and businesses. All the choice locations have already been taken. The agricultural produce from the latest farmers is grown on outlying land and it has to be brought a considerable distance to the central markets.
Consequently these goods are more costly to supply. Those who can produce them more cheaply on conveniently located central lands, soon discover that without loss they can adjust their prices slightly below those of the "marginal farmers". The pioneers can now enjoy the surplus income (over actual cost) in a raised standard of living, whilst the poorer farmers located on the fringes of the community barely scrape by. After manufactured goods become available and commerce has developed, the land that lays closest to the factories, shops, offices and homes, is able to command for its owners some amazingly high ground-rents for the same reason. Central sites allow for greater labor specialization, higher efficiency and lower total unit costs. Â The most productive land is central to the town and it has the greatest value. The land-owners are now able to speculate in this valuable resource. They would rather wait for a new highway or rail-road to be planned and for the potential usefulness that this confers on their originally acquired fields, than put this land to the plow. When they rent it out as small parcels for commercial use, they can demand a total income that is hundreds if not thousands of times more in goods-value than what was grown by the pioneers on sites of equal size and fertility. They can do this without performing a stroke of work and without employing a single laborer, although some will make a token gesture to use their land in a more socially-justifiable way. Eventually and inevitably the land is sold at amazingly high prices for use in manufacture, commerce or residence.
Due to land speculation, as sites become available their prices are inflated, regardless of whether they are sold, leased or rented. This is our situation in Israel today. The most productive and valuable parts of our land are held by monopolists who speculate in them, driving up the cost of the produce (be it food or manufactured goods), of residence and even of travel. Our gift from nature (or inheritance from G-d, depending on how you see it), has become vitally important, due to the increases in population density and the municipal development that goes with it. From the selfish point of view of the monopolistic landowner, it is better to hold the land out of use. He can borrow from the banks, which will gladly help him to buy some more of the outlying land, because it is certain to rise greatly in value. When he sells this land he will collect more money than a past generation of farmers could have possibly earned.  Our betterment tax on land value (which was intended to stop land speculation) is mostly avoided. Much of the development land is in the hands of the local authorities who obviously don’t pay tax to themselves. The town planners and lawyers are the first to inform the banks where a new suburb is projected. Then the banks can speculate by lending money for the development of this land. When it is sold, much of the true value will be passed "under the table" before the contract is handed over for signature. On kibbutz, the land that was purchased from money that our fathers once collected by JNF donations (mine did anyway, his name is in the Golden Book), is now being sold for astronomical sums, in order to cover the debts that these communities now owe. Â
The selfish non-use and speculation of this huge resource, the value of which is continuing growing, due to public investment within the community, provides the monopolists of our land with an income that in effect is taken from the ground-rents. This misdirection of rent is the cause of the high prices and relative low demand of our consumer goods. The landlessness of the hired worker coupled with the low demand for his efforts, create a lack of available jobs, which then result in our current unemployment and poverty. Before the ground-rent became significant and people held back on the use of land, there was never any unemployment.
The obvious answer to this problem of improperly used ground-rent (some of which the land owner/user does not even know about, since in effect he pays it to himself), is to collect a proportion of it as a tax for public use. After all, much of the ground-rent (in the form of interest) should be due to public investment in the streets, sewers, transport systems and emergency services in the first place. Therefore it is socially just and fitting to take this gain for public use. The effect of taxing most material items is to suppress them, but you can’t do this with the land, because it is there anyway. The effect of introducing even a small amount of land-value tax would be to cause many of the speculators to sell land to people who will use it properly and who are able and willing to pay the community for the privilege, particularly if other taxes can be reduced.  The writer has been studying macroeconomics for many years. Some of his research has been into the effect of various taxation methods on the equilibrium of these generalized social systems. Unlike most other models of the system, the one he uses separates the micro- from the macroeconomics properties and uses only the latter. The previous example about income-tax can be extended. An increase in this tax will enable the government to employ more people and to provide better social services, education, etc. (particularly to the poorer sector, whose need for them is greatest). It can do this without changing the average national income (because the same total sum of money is involved, whilst being distributed differently). But of more significance, using a simple model based on common-sense assumptions, and by some numerical analysis that a high-school student could follow, this writer has found that a tax on land-values will quickly stimulate the system 50% more than when the same added tax burden is laid on personal income.  The introduction of a modest amount of land-value taxation will enable us to morally and justly pull ourselves out of the economic quagmire, in which we have been floundering for many years. This is a sorely felt need by all those land-less souls who are without work and lack the opportunity to earn enough to survive without having either to beg, lie or steal.       Â
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Having viewed many of Rabbi Jill Jacobs’ videos on Youtube and knowing of her work to make the world a better place, she has my deepest respect. I look forward to buying her book soon and adding it to the collection of the Vilnius Jewish Library here in Lithuania. As I imagine Rabbi Jacobs has found out time and again, it is far easier to get people to throw words of support at a project instead of dollars. Certainly I have received my share of kind words over and over again. I plan to take all those words and scrounge up a couple of dollars and buy myself a cup of coffee. I am starting to get the impression that most people think the only real tzedakah is a Neil Sedaka and nothing else matters.
Wyman Brent, shammes Vilnius Jewish Library
People who know their passion will always influence the world. Â We are now in a unique position in which we can help to save the teachers of the teachers.
 Please visit http://www.savehuc.comÂ
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