Nearly 2 million Israelis below poverty line in 2023; 1 in 4 children are poor
National Insurance Institute figures show that 20.7% of the population was living in poverty in 2023, including 872,400 children; Arab and ultra-Orthodox communities are worst off
Nearly two million people were living below the poverty line in Israel in 2023, including 872,400 children and 158,500 senior citizens, according to an annual report released Wednesday by the National Insurance Institute.
A total of 1.98 million people were living below the line, placing the country second to last in the OECD poverty rating according to disposable income, with Costa Rica worst.
The figures mean that 20.7 percent of people in the country lived in poverty, with 27.9% of children and 12.8% of senior citizens below the line. However, the figure for children showed a slight improvement from 28.1% in 2022. The senior citizens’ rate remained the same.
Children make up 44% of those living in poverty, though they are only 32.5% of the population.
Though the report gave Israel the second highest poverty rate in the OECD, the ranking compared Israel’s rate for 2023 with some other countries’ ranking in 2022, among them the United States. The OECD report for that year put the US as second worst with a poverty rate of 18%, and Israel at 16.9%.
The NII report did not give specific figures for other countries but noted that the OECD average is 11.6%.
It highlighted that rates of deprivation are at their highest in the Arab (38.4%) and ultra-Orthodox (33%) communities. In those two communities, half the children are living below the poverty line.
The HII gave the minimum monthly income below which a household is considered poor. For a single person, the minimum is NIS 3,324 ($926), for a couple NIS 6,648 ($1,853), and for a family with two children NIS 10,637 ($2,965). Additional children raise costs with a family with five children requiring a minimum of NIS 15,789 ($4,402) to stay above the poverty line.
According to the NII, the poorest locality was the ultra-Orthodox settlement of Modiin Ilit (48.3%), followed by Jerusalem (38.3%), Beit Shemesh (36.3%), Bnei Brak (30.7%) and Lod (21.2%).
Prices rose in 2023 by 4.2%, the report said, pressuring those with lower income and forcing them to cut other expenses, such as 9.7% who gave up on medical treatment due to financial considerations or 5% who were not able to have a hot meal at least once every two days.
The ongoing war in the Gaza Strip cut the country’s economic growth from 6.5% in 2022 to just 2% in 2023.
It has impacted younger people who have been called for long periods to serve in the army reserves or because their places of work closed down. Tourism and catering industries have also suffered due to a drop in demand.
Without the government subsidies that are provided to lower-income families, the poverty rate would have reached 31.1%, up from 30.6% in 2022, the report said.
Among its recommendations, the National Insurance Institute said care must be taken with the Arrangements Law — a companion to the state budget that determines how funds will be disbursed — to ensure that the most vulnerable sectors of the population are not further harmed.
On Monday the Knesset passed a first reading of the 2025 state budget. The same day the Knesset Finance Committee approved a series of tax hikes that are expected to erode the income of Israel’s working population.
The war in the Gaza Strip began on October 7, 2023, when Palestinian terror group Hamas led a devastating cross-border attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people. In the meantime, Israel fought another war against the allied terror group Hezbollah in Lebanon which began to attack Israel in support of Gaza the day after the Hamas assault. The war with Hezbollah ended last month with a ceasefire.
The Times of Israel Community.