Ashkenazi Jews' salaries continue to eclipse Sephardic figures
NGO report shows gap still exists based on ancestry, gender. Top 10 percentiles of earners compromise 28.3% of country's total income
An average Jew of Ashkenazi background earns 42% more than the country's average salary while a Sephardic Jew only earns nine percent more than the average. The gap between Jews and Arabs is even greater, as the latter's salaries are 34% lower than the average.
While statistics from 2001 were similar for Ashkenazi Jews, Sephardic Jews saw an improvement in the past decade, when their average salary was underneath the national average.
Shlomo Swirski, a sociologist from Adva Center, said the data shows how many Ashkenazic Jews are in the highest salary percentiles.
"Ashkenazis have an advantage in all these parameters (place of residence, education, management positions) and the result is a prominent advantage in salary."
Gender inequality also exists in the workplace. Women's monthly salary is only 66% of men's.
Other disparities in the country's economy are the earnings of the top 10 percentiles, which comprises 28.3% of the total salaries in Israel. The average monthly salary for CEOs of companies on the stock exchange is NIS 377,000 ($107,000). The bottom 50 percentiles constitute 23.9% of the total salaries. As well, 73% of citizens' salaries didn't pass the average salary.
"Our society isn't drifting towards greater equality, but rather quite the opposite," Swirsky said. "Israeli governments have been trying to intensify the business sector while cutting on back the budget."
Swirsky said the result is that small capital groups are taking over key parts of the economy, such as the hi-tech industry.
The start-up nation, he said, has been wildly successful, but the problem is that it is dominated by Ashkenazi Jews living in the center of the country.
