Jerusalem's Commuters

By Omer Yaniv

Morning. You’ve finished your coffee and sent the kids off to school. It’s time to go to work. But if you live in Jerusalem, your commute to work might not be so simple: Is your workplace within walking or biking distance from home? Or must you rely on a car or public transportation? As of 2013 about 61% of Jerusalem residents indicated, through the Central Bureau of Statistics Social Survey, that they have an inconvenient commute to work. One of the main reasons for this is the high percentage of Jerusalem residents who do not own a vehicle: 46%, compared with 33% for Israel at large, as of 2013. Thus, many of the city’s residents depend on transportation provided by their employer, on carpools, or on public transportation in order to reach their workplace. 

The percentage of Jerusalem residents who require more than half an hour to reach their workplace is 45%, significantly higher than the national average of 33%. By comparison, the percentage of Tel Aviv and Haifa residents whose work commute takes more than half an hour is 25% and 28%, respectively. These data reflect the efficiency of public transportation systems in various cities during morning rush hour, but they might also indicate the importance of workplace proximity to home in choosing a place to live, or the lack of employment options near the city. 

According to the 2008 census of the Central Bureau of Statistics, about 51% of Jerusalem’s residents commute to work by private vehicle (compared with 54% of Tel Aviv residents and 58% of Haifa residents), while 34% use public transportation or transportation arranged by the employer (compared with 28% of Tel Aviv residents and 27% of Haifa residents), and only 13% commute by bicycle or foot (comparable to the figure for Tel Aviv residents, and compared with 10% of Haifa residents). The census data also indicate that the average distance to work for Jerusalem District residents is slightly below the national average (11.4 km versus 13.6 km, respectively). Given that Jerusalem residents make greater use of public transportation, we can certainly point to a correlation between the long work commute time in Jerusalem and the extensive use of public transportation on the part of the city’s residents.

Women's Education and the Labor Force

Caroline Kahlenberg

A recently publicized Science and Technology Ministry study revealed that in almost half of Israel's universities, women made up only 20% of the faculty. While this severe under-representation of women is not new, it occurs today even at a time when women in Israel are more highly educated on average than men. The gap between women's educational achievements and their situation in the university labor market invites us to explore the relationship between gender, education, and the workforce more broadly. 

Over the past decades, women in Israel have been acquiring higher education at an increasing rate. In 1969-1970, women made up 46.9% of all first-degree students at institutions of higher education, reaching 54.1% in 1989-90 and 56.6% in 2012-13. In 1980 only 32% of Israel's doctoral students were women, but by 2012-13 this figure rose to 52.1%. 

Yet despite the steep increase in women's education, the situation in the labor market still contains major gaps. As the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute's 2014 Gender Index shows, contrary to popular opinion, women's educational achievements do not alone necessarily translate into better pay, job positions, or status in the labor market. In 2012, the average monthly (gross) salary in Israel for men (NIS 11,400) was 50% higher than the average for women (NIS 7,600). While part of this can be attributed to the fact that women work fewer hours than men, the gap also exists in hourly pay: In 2012, the average hourly wage in Israel for men (55 NIS) was 17% higher than it was for women (47 NIS). 

Jerusalem's labor force contains a slightly different story. Because of the special status of its workforce (with especially low participation of Jewish men and Arab women), the gender gap in workforce characteristics is not as stark. In 2012, the average hourly wage for men in Jerusalem (47 NIS) was comparable to that for women (46 NIS), and the gap between men and women's monthly salary was only 25% (as compared to 46% in Tel Aviv, and 61% in Haifa). 

If we look at a different aspect of Jerusalem's labor market—at overall labor force participation among the entire 24-54 year-old population, rather than at characteristics within the workforce—we can see a major gap between Jerusalem men's and women's participation according to educational attainment. As the graph displays, even when comparing men and women who have completed the same level of education, labor force participation rates are consistently higher among men. However, as women's educational attainment increases, so does their participation in the labor force, which narrows the gap between men and women's participation. Out of those who last attended primary and intermediate school, only 10% of women and 81% of men participate in the labor force. Among those with secondary school education, 43% of women and 89% of men participate in the workforce. Meanwhile, 71% of women and 91% of men with post-secondary school education, and 80% of women and 90% of men who last attended academic institutions, participate in the labor force.

"Market" Survey

Dafna Shemer

Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies www.jiis.org

Recent years have seen increased tourism in markets throughout the world. The local market, Mahane Yehuda, is no exception. We examined the mix of businesses in the market, so as to see how this trend has manifested here. 

The boundaries of the market are not clearly delineated, but we defined them for the sake of this assessment as covering the streets between Jaffa Road to the north and Agripas to the south, Ets-Haim (the roofed part of the market) to the east, and the Iraqi market and Mahane Yehuda Street to the west. In all we examined a total of 370 businesses situated within an area of 19 dunams (1 dunam is approximately ¼ acre). By way of comparison, the Malha Mall has nearly 230 stores spread out over some 20 dunams in a building with two and a half floors of commercial space. 

Most of the market’s businesses still focus on selling food. Fruit and vegetable stands are the most prevalent type of stall (82 businesses), constituting 22% of all market businesses. There are 25 kiosks for nuts, seeds, and snacks (7% of businesses), 22 butchers (6%), 18 bakeries and 18 spice shops (5% each), 12 fish shops (3%), 9 pastry shops, and 7 pickled goods stalls. In all, these comprise over half the businesses in the market (52%). 

The market has a wide variety of businesses, including 24 clothing and accessories stores, 15 housewares stores, 3 stores for cellular telephone accessories, 3 jewelry stores, 2 lottery stands, and one synagogue (on Ha-Egoz Street). 

Specific types of stores are concentrated in certain areas. Thus, for example, if you have a craving for fish, chances are good you would buy it on Ha-Tapu’ach Street, which has four fish shops (and until recently a fifth), a third of the fish shops in the market. If you want to buy meat, you likely looked for it on Ha-Harov Street, which has five butchers, a quarter of the market’s total. The Iraqi Market and Georgian Market have large concentrations of fruit and vegetable shops.

If you want to take a break and eat something, you’ll find the widest variety of restaurants and pubs near the intersection of Ha-Tut and Ha-Egoz Streets, where your options range from falafel to kubbeh, fish and chips, or jahnun. A total of four food service chains operate in the market, three falafel stands, and one ice cream stand. Some of the restaurants and pubs stay open after the market stalls have closed, thus extending the hours of market activity. 

If you make plans to meet someone near the Ethiopian spice shop, you’d better be specific: each of the parallel streets Ha-Shazif, Ha-Afarsek, and Eliyahu Banai has a shop of Ethiopian spices, legumes, and dried foods. All findings are current as of our tour and examination of the market, after we used the services of Google’s street view as a basis. 

Translated by Merav Datan

Will the Dream Soon Come True?

Ruth Abraham

Recently it seems that the Ethiopian community has raised its head. What began as a video that circulated through the internet, depicting racially motivated police brutality, turned into a protest reminiscent of the violent riots taking place simultaneously in Baltimore, Maryland, in the United States. Data of the Central Bureau of Statistics indicate that the cities in Israel with the highest percentage of Ethiopians relative to the total population of the city are Kiryat Malachi (16.2%), Afula (8%), and Kiryat Gat (7.9%), all of which are characterized by low socioeconomic status. Jerusalem’s Ethiopian community constitutes 0.7% of the total population, and the city takes second place – after Tel Aviv – in a ranking of localities with 2,000 or more residents of Ethiopian heritage. The Ethiopian community’s protest raises questions with respect to all new immigrants in Israel. 

From 2010 to 2013 a total of 67,000 new immigrants moved to Israel from throughout the world: 43% from the former Soviet Union, 14% from the United States, and 12% from Ethiopia and France each. A total of 14% settled in Jerusalem, which ranks third as a destination city for new immigrants, after Tel Aviv and Netanya. Analysis of data from the Statistical Yearbook of Jerusalem reveals that the percentage of new immigrants from countries with high socioeconomic status who choose to settle in this city is equal to or greater than their percentage among new immigrants to Israel during these years. This trend is reversed among immigrants from Ethiopia and the former Soviet Union.

The immigrants who settled in Jerusalem during these years – 52% of whom were from the United States and France and not one from Ethiopia – chose to take up residence primarily in neighborhoods with high socioeconomic status. In Talbiya the proportion of new immigrants who arrived during these years constitute 9% of the Jewish population of the neighborhood; in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City, City Center, and Rehavya they constitute 7% of the population (in each neighborhood); and in the German Colony they account for 6%. In contrast, a broad look at the years 1990-2013 reveals that the neighborhood with the highest percentage of immigrants as a proportion of its Jewish population is Pisgat Ze’ev North, with a total of 4,900 residents, accounting for 30% of the neighborhood’s Jewish population. Most of the immigrants in this neighborhood arrived during the years 1990-1999, primarily from the former Soviet Union, and they number 3,700 residents, constituting 23% of the neighborhood’s Jewish population. There are 980 immigrants who arrived during the years 2000-2009, accounting for 6%, while the immigrants who arrived during 2010-2013 – who, as noted, represent more than 6% of the affluent neighborhoods in the city center – constitute only 1.4% of the Jewish population of Pisgat Ze’ev North. 

Jerusalem does indeed offer a home to new immigrants, but primarily those from wealthy countries. At the same time, immigrants from other countries actually stay away from the city. One might attribute this to Zionist considerations motivating the first, but one cannot ignore the socioeconomic exclusion that results from housing prices and employment opportunities in the city. 

Sources:

1. “The Ethiopian Population in Israel – Selected Data on the Occasion of the Sigd Holiday,” Central Bureau of Statistics, November 2014

2. Statistical Yearbook of Jerusalem, Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies, 2015