"We'd be very pleased to announce a reduction in poverty if there has actually been one."
National Insurance Institute officials today implied that yesterday's critique of the credibility and reliability of its poverty statistics by chief statistician Shlomo Yitzhaki was part of the government's stubborn attempt to claim that poverty in Israel is less severe than depicted by the National Insurance's Poverty Report. The officials also implied that Yitzhaki was embittered that no agreement has yet been reached on the recommendation of the committee he headed for the publication of another index of poverty.
National Insurance deputy director general for research Daniel Gotlieb told "Globes", "We'd be very pleased to announce a reduction in poverty if there has actually been one, but it's impossible to accuse the people analyzing the data based on a given situation. There's a lot of things that could be done to reduce poverty in Israel."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on September 25, 2008
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2008