Published: 22 February 2018
Last updated: 4 March 2024
At the end of the month, he couldn’t pay for much more than his rent.
“It was a struggle for me,” said Yuter, who left the rabbinate and moved to Israel in 2014. He said that 70% of his salary went to pay for the small apartment he lived in near the synagogue; he also said that he economized on food.
Yuter’s predicament, according to a new survey of Modern Orthodox pulpit and campus rabbis, was not unusual. The survey revealed that while the Modern Orthodox Jewish community is changing, its financial arrangements with its spiritual leaders are stuck deep in the past. Many rabbis struggle on part-time salaries. Half the rabbis surveyed received no health insurance from their employers and no retirement benefits.
“I certainly see the stress rabbis deal with in their lives,” said Rabbi Ronald Schwarzberg of Yeshiva University’s Centre for the Jewish Future, who oversaw the study.
FULL STORY Modern Orthodox rabbis are struggling, even as the community gets wealthier (Forward)
