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Center for Public Policy (CPP)
CPP at JIMS disseminates position papers to Israel's lawmakers and the general public on economic
issues currently being debated in the Knesset. Our position papers are often cited in Knesset
committee discussions and in the popular Press.
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Yarden Gazit and Zev Golan
Israeli land policy has been state-led and centralized for decades. The state owns 93 percent of the land. In recent years, the centralization of land policy
in the hands of a few bureaucrats has made it difficult to establish new townships in Israel's periphery (the Negev and Galilee). JIMS’ paper identifies the
key obstacles for development and recommends ways to address them.
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Boaz Arad
In recent years, court rulings have induced large expenditures from the government and have had significant economic consequences. The courts hand down
rulings that lead to the spending of hundreds of millions, sometimes billions, of shekels from the public purse.
JIMS’ paper reviews several economic rulings of the courts and calculates their costs. Although the analysis is only partial, in the
sense that only five projects were studied, the total cost already reaches 29 billion shekels.
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Yarden Gazit
Legislation to curb executive pay has been suggested by members of Knesset, and a ministerial committee has been set up to study the issue.
The paper reviews the academic literature in Israel and abroad on executive pay, and determines that executive pay is strongly correlated to firm performance.
Furthermore, the paper shows that the sharp rise in executive pay in recent decades can be fully explained by market-driven reasons.
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Yarden Gazit
Israeli insurance companies are often criticized for treating their customers unfairly. The paper examines the market for automobile property
insurance and suggests ways to improve its functioning. After surveying the characteristics of the market, it concludes that tight and inefficient
regulation puts barriers to entry, raises premiums and doesn't allow companies to compete.
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Yarden Gazit
Public television has few viewers and a large annual budget deficit likely to reach 100 million shekels by 2010. The Israeli government wants
"to rescue" public broadcasting, forcing the public to pay obligatory fees and taxes to cover public television channels. In this position paper,
JIMS argues against the rescue and questions the value of public television from both an economic and democratic point of view.
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Boaz Arad
When it comes to teaching environment and climate change, the State of Israel, as many other western States has adopted the view of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
In this paper, JIMS shows that the IPCC theories have been scientifically questioned by other theories of climate change and therefore Israeli students should be taught all
existing competing theories.
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Boaz Arad
JIMS' Position Paper examines the economic and environmental benefits accruing from small homesteads in the Negev and urges the government
to resolve specific legal and zoning issues preventing their future development.
Zev Golan and Boaz Arad presented this paper at the Knesset during committee deliberations.
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Hana Dar Starowicz
In light of the impending sale of 15% of the shares of the ports of Ashdod and Haifa to private parties, JIMS assessed the economic feasibility of
partial privatization. Unfortunately, JIMS' findings show that the continued degradation of the ports' management over the last few years has greatly
reduced the attractiveness of the ports. The lack of economic efficiency is clear: the number of workers has increased by around 9% over the past few years
and the volume of economic activity has been at best stagnant.
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Boaz Arad
The Knesset discussed a new bill that would prevent foreign ownership of daily newspapers. This initiative seems to be directed against
Sheldon Adelson, the owner of "Israel Today" a free daily with a readership that has increased by 112% within the past year.JIMS' Position Paper warns
against the dangers of such an initiative for the freedom of the press and democracy in Israel.
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Boaz Arad
Of the 275,000 foreigners working in Israel, about half are here illegally and over 100,000 entered Israel as tourists.
In this JIMS Position Paper, analyst Boaz Arad critiques the government efforts to pay Israelis to take their jobs and suggests a
reform in the method used to bring them to Israel. The paper also argues that foreign workers are good for Israel's and
that reducing their numbers will harm the local economy.
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Boaz Arad
The Bank of Israel policy of buying dollars to keep the exchange rate artificially higher than the market price is a risky business. In the past
6 months the dollar has lost about 15% of its value against the Swiss franc, about 10% against the Japanese Yen and about 30% against
the Australian dollar, about 14% against the euro and -- 15% against the shekel. According to JIMS' lastest study, this policy subsidies
the export industry but hurts the other sectors of the economy.
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Zev Golan
The chief scientist program is designed to support
Israeli technological projects. The level of subsidization,
as revealed in JIMS' position paper, is much higher than
the level used by OECD members. In fact,the Chief Scientist office distributes freely taxpayers' money
without filtering and sorting the best projects.
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Zev Golan
The Ministry of Finance is thinking of raising the VAT
on all other products from 16.5% to 17.5%, or increasing
income taxes to cover their "overdraft." JIMS' research
paper explains why such proposals are bad for Israel's
economy and for the ministry of finance.
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Keren Harel Harari
The Israeli government intends to raise 200 billion ₪ this year and in 2010
(100 billion each year) by issuing government bonds. From this,
140 billion shekels would be raise on the domestic market and 60 billion on the
international market. Some of these funds will be used to re-finance the debt
taken in 2002 -2003, but 80 billion are new debt.
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Keren Harel Harari
"The Wisconsin Program" currently called Orot Letasuka (Lights for Employment)
in Israel was intended to assist the recipients of welfare grants to integrate in
the labor market and reduce the extent of welfare grants that constitute a burden on
the state treasury.According to the Ministry of Finance, the program has proven itself,
because in the regions where the program is currently operating the number of those
who receive income supplements has declined by 52% as opposed to a decline of only 7.2%
in those regions where only the State Employment service is functioning.
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Keren Harel Harari
As early as 1990 an attempt was made to cancel the 0% VAT rate on fruits and vegetables.
As a result of fierce opposition and problems that were raised at the time concerning
implementation, it was ultimately decided to leave the situation as it was. Today,
after almost 20 years, the Finance Ministry is once again attempting to revoke the
VAT exemption on fruits and vegetables. Additionally, the Finance Ministry suggests
raising the VAT rate by 1% for a year and a half (from 15.5% to 16.5%), despite
promises last year to lower VAT by 1%. However, these decisions would only take effect
after preliminary approval by the Knesset Finance Committee, and currently, a majority
in opposition to the measure is forming in the committee.
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