What kind of finance minister will Avigdor Liberman be?
Israel’s incoming finance minister Avigdor Liberman is expected to take a different approach to his position than his predecessors. Whereas outgoing Finance Minister Israel Katz largely pinned his goals to those of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Liberman is positioning himself to assume the position with great power and wield it as he sees fit.
The Yisrael Beytenu leader knows how to play the game of Israeli politics, and has previously served in many other senior roles in government, including defense minister and foreign minister.
As part of his coalition agreement, Liberman managed to grab the chairmanship of the Knesset’s powerful Finance Committee for a member of his own party. The Finance Committee controls many of the matters relating to the nation’s budget and spending decisions, and keeping that close by will allow him to consolidate control over the Israeli economy in a way that Katz, and Moshe Kahlon before him, could not.
Accused and ultimately acquitted of corruption charges in 2013, Liberman was widely seen at the time as corrupt, but his attacks focused on Netanyahu’s alleged corruption charges seem to have helped Liberman shed that part of his image.
He is seen as a strong-willed political leader who has no problems playing the role of the bad guy when it suits him. Those close to Liberman note that he tends to study a field deeply and listen to the advice of professionals before moving forward on a strategic plan, something that isn’t always the case with political figures.
Liberman is seen as a right-of-center market capitalist who will wage war against bureaucracy and regulatory inefficiency, and invest heavily in infrastructure projects. Central to his beliefs is a desire to increase economic equality for different sectors of society.
Liberman is known for his antagonistic views toward parts of the haredi (ultra-Orthodox) community for their refusal to participate in the workforce, the army, and mainstream education. He is expected to reduce subsidies to the haredim and move to implement a mandatory core curriculum in all state-funded schools as part of a plan to help move more people from that sector into the workforce.
He is also staunchly dedicated to drafting haredim into the army, and canceling the Chief Rabbinate’s monopoly on kashrut.
One of Liberman’s first priorities will be to finally get a national budget approved for 2021, and later put forward a two-year budget for 2022-3. He is also in favor of raising the retirement age for men and women to 70, while strengthening pension plans.
Liberman also said last week that he doesn’t plan to initiate any tax increases or budget cuts in the immediate future, and that he plans to invest tens of billions of shekels in infrastructure projects in the near future.
Liberman gave some public indication of the directions his office may take when he said last week that he would stop providing unemployment payments to all people under age 45 as of July 1, according to N12.
The question of how Israel should handle unemployment benefits after June had been a delicate issue for Israel’s post-pandemic recovery, and Katz had previously put forward a more patient plan under which job seekers would be given a maximum number of days for which they can receive unemployment benefits, based on their age and number of dependents.
Liberman’s approach would help push more people to rejoin the workforce, but could spell disaster for thousands of breadwinners that are still legitimately struggling to find work.
That last point may be a testing ground for two competing values. Liberman doesn’t believe in free handouts, but strongly belies that those who contribute to the system and genuinely need it should be entitled to the support of the state. How he navigates this particular issue may provide certain clues as to how his style will play going forward.