for Social Policy Studies in Israel Research that makes a difference for Social Policy Studies in Israel Research that makes a difference Taub Center Taub "The Center's researchers make an important contribution to the public and professional discourse in Israel … they raise key questions and issues in a professional way - in-depth and unbiased. The work of the Center enriches our understanding and knowledge Our Team of the social and economic processes in the country, and in this way helps the public and policy makers to design policy on the basis of professional analyses." Mission Dr. Karnit Flug, Governor of the Bank of Israel The Taub Center for Social Policy Studies in Israel is an Our Impact independent, non-partisan, socioeconomic research institute based in Jerusalem. The Center conducts high-quality, impartial research on socioeconomic "The dialogue with the Taub Center forces me each time conditions in Israel, and develops innovative, equitable anew to think differently, to listen to original positions, and practical options for macro public policies that and to confront the real challenges facing the State of advance the well-being of Israelis. The Center strives to Publications and Events Israel in their entirety." influence public policy through direct communications with policy makers and by enriching the public debate Minister of Finance Yair Lapid, Yesh Atid Party Chair and Founder that accompanies the decision making process. Taub Center Taub Our Team About Us The Taub Center provides the country's top policy makers Our Impact and the general public with a professional, evidence-based, "big picture" perspective and policy options in the economic and social spheres. The Center's five interdisciplinary Policy Programs in education, labor, social welfare, health, and economics bring together prominent academic researchers and leading experts from the policy realm. Together they carry out cutting-edge analyses of the nature, source, scope, Publications and Events and resolution of some of the most severe challenges that Israel is facing. Studies from the Taub Center show: Center Taub Gap in labor productivity between G7 and Israel has been rising for decades The Start-Up Nation’s Threat from Within Israel’s labor productivity is not only low, it has been falling steadily behind the world’s leading economies, the G7 countries, in relative terms. A productivity gap has been growing over the past four decades between the G7 and Israel – with potentially negative implications for Israel’s future ability to keep its brightest minds at home. Our Team For roughly four decades, Israel has been situated on a number of socioeconomic domestic trajectories that are unsustainable in the GDP per Work-Hour, 1970-2012 long run. Center experts have long pointed out that Israel is a study in in 2005 PPP-adjusted dollars irony. While the country sits at the forefront of technological advances and breeds numerous start-ups, it has unparalleled rates of academic 45 emigration and an education system that is ranked among the worst in G7 the Western world. 40 Our Impact However, while other parts of the developed world are aging rapidly, 35 Israel’s population is young and its potential enormous – as long as today’s children receive the kind of education that the country's 30 immense knowledge base is capable of providing. 25 Israel The Taub Center is strategically situated to offer empirical evidence and policy recommendations to the public and policy makers alike. 20 Publications and Events Likewise, Center experts brief influential non-profit organizations, 15 civil society leaders, students, foundations, Jewish federations, and 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2012 others to ensure that field work and philanthropy is grounded in a solid understanding of Israel’s current challenges and opportunities. Source: Dan Ben-David, State of the Nation Report 2009 (updated), Taub Center Data: Central Bureau of Statistics, Bank of Israel, OECD Taub Center Taub Our Team Our Impact "The research that you do at the Taub Center is no less important than what is taught Publications and Events at the universities." President Shimon Peres (during his tenure) Prof. Dan Ben-David presenting the main points of the State of the Nation Report to President Shimon Peres (during his tenure) Taub Center Taub Our Team Executive Director Prof. Dan Ben-David Our Team "In the past year, it seems that Ben-David, the head of the Taub Center for Social Prof. Dan Ben-David serves as the Executive Director of the Taub Policy Studies in Israel, has succeeded Center for Social Policy Studies in Israel and is a senior faculty member of the Department of Public Policy at Tel Aviv University. He has a in conveying his message. His words Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Chicago and specializes in resound in almost every major senior macroeconomics, economic growth and international trade. Prof. Ben- David was named "Person of the Year" by the newspaper in forum, and insights that were once the Calcalist 2010, included among the 100 most influential people in Israel by Haaretz- Our Impact purview of economists are now the ruling TheMarker newspaper in 2010 and 2012, and among the 50 most influential axioms." people in Israeli education by Ha’ir newspaper in 2007. Academically, Prof. Ben-David was ranked among the 1,000 most cited academic economists Mickey Peled, Calcalist newspaper in the world and among the ten most cited economists in Israel during the years 1990-2000. He is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) in London, a former Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau for Economic Research (NBER) in Cambridge, Publications and Events Massachusetts and has served as an adviser to the World Bank and the World Trade Organization. Prof. Ben-David received the Tel Aviv University Provost’s "Best Teacher Award" in Social Sciences in 2004 and was included in the Provost’s list of the University’s best teachers in 2012. Taub Center Taub The Taub Center Team The Taub Center’s team is dynamic and diverse, with an active group of researchers including professors from Israel’s leading universities and up-and-coming young economists, all supported by a group of outstanding professionals focusing on the Center’s management and the dissemination of its research findings. Accompanying these dedicated professionals is the Center’s Board of Directors – a select group of committed individuals who recognize the potential of the Center to make a meaningful Our Team impact on all segments of Israeli society. The International Advisory Council consists of some of the world’s top academic researchers, including several Nobel Laureates. Taub Center Researcher Sagit Azary-Viesel at a symposium for the Yesh Atid party's Knesset members Should we change to say: שגית אזארי ויזל, חוקרת במרכז טאוב, בהרצאה בפני מתנדבי חינוך לפסגות "The economic dialogue in Israel is changing in Our Impact front of our very eyes … Decisive evidence of this change appears in the findings of the State of the Nation Report, which was published this week by the Taub Center. In a series of in-depth, original studies, the Center's economists report new Publications and Events findings on inequality and poverty in Israeli society." Sever Plotsker, Senior Editor and Columnist, Yediot Ahronot newspaper Taub Center Taub "This past year, the Taub Center has made an impressive turnaround and has begun to Our Team examine much more significant and painful areas: those areas where if a change is really going to be made, there will need to be a confrontation with the strong factions in the economy that enjoy the current status quo." Our Impact Guy Rolnik, Deputy Publisher of Haaretz newspaper, Founder and Editor-in-Chief of TheMarker newspaper Publications and Events Prof. Dan Ben-David speaking to the tent protesters in the summer of 2011 "[The Taub Center] is a stand-alone institute, in that it doesn’t Center Taub "Thanks to the Taub Center, for its intensive really have direct competition, outside of the government, on the work that tries to truthfully reflect the Israeli data and the analysis of poverty, education, health, and all the socioeconomic reality … for the cabinet ministers, issues that come from the activity of the government in the social for the Knesset members, for the policy makers economic spheres of the State of Israel." Taub Center Deputy and for the relevant government offices." Director, Prof. Ayal Kimhi, Knesset Opposition Leader Isaac Herzog, Labor Party Chair at a symposium for the MK Shuli Mualem (Ha’Bayit Ha’Yehudi party) Yesh Atid party's Knesset members Our Team Our Impact Prof. Dov Chernichovsky - Chair of the Taub Center Healthcare Prof. Dan Ben-David and Governor Policy Program - and Liora Bowers, Taub Center Director of Policy, of the Bank of Israel, Prof. Stanley Knesset Opposition Leader and Labor Party Chair, MK Isaac (Buji) Herzog, and Taub presenting alongside OECD officials Fischer (during his tenure) Center Marketing and Communications Director Gal Ben Dor "We are working toward increased investment "Just this week we saw research by the in education and the creation of a supportive Taub Center for Social Policy, which Publications and Events environment for workers, all of this is in the spirit truly does God's work, and the research of the Taub Center Report, see page 57. I ask shows how many people in Israel … you to turn to page 57. It is very, very interesting." need an additional NIS 190 or NIS 200 Deputy Minister of Finance Mickey Levy (Yesh Atid to eat." MK Basel Ghattas and Taub Center party) during a Knesset debate centering on Taub Prof. Dan Ben-David with diplomat and Researcher Haim Bleikh MK Arieh Deri (Shas Party Chair) Center findings foreign policy scholar Dennis Ross "The Report before you presents Center Taub facts and reality.