Jewish GDP over $10 Billion?

Aaron Keyak — April 23, 2009 – 3:06 pm | Domestic Policy | Israel Comments (0) Add a comment

Mark Pearlman, a business strategist and MIT graduate, calculated that the “Jewish GDP…well exceeds $10 billion.”

They don’t note the very important fact that NJDC accounts for at least 0.1% of the Jewish Gross Domestic Product.

Here’s an excerpt:

Pearlman used publicly available filings, primarily via the Web sites GuideStar and Charity Navigator, from more than 400 Jewish non-profit organizations, and focused on all financial data. The revenue data for each organization was then “compiled and categorized according to systematic service groupings” like education, communal life, etc.

The results, he readily admits, are incomplete, in large part because religious organizations are exempt from filing tax reports available to the public. But what he has found makes for some fascinating study and discussion points in our community — for instance, that the Jewish GDP is $9.7 billion, with most funds going to social welfare (25 percent), followed by education (20 percent).

Twelve percent of services provided go for communal life, with 3 percent for advocacy, 1 percent for the arts, and less than 1 percent for Arab-Israel relations.

More than 25 percent of all funds come through the Jewish federation system, and 33 percent of all revenue is concentrated among the top 10 nonprofits, including UJA-Federation of New York, the Jewish Agency for Israel, Hadassah, American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, Yeshiva University, FEGS Health and Human Service System, Jewish Geriatric Center.

Perhaps most surprising is that no Jewish organization has undertaken this kind of data gathering, which could create a clear and standardized annual snapshot of how many — and how — Jewish nonprofit dollars are generated in this country.

Pearlman says he undertook the study on his own because of his concern for the lack of a systematic approach to collecting financial data in the community. He has no particular cause to promote or axe to grind, but wondered “how can we effectively plan for the future without a clear understanding of our base year starting point?”

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