The socio-economic structure of the Jewish people differs radically from that of other nations. Ours is an anomalous, abnormal structure. Stubborn Galut  [Diaspora, Exile] champions often reject or ignore this truth. Recently, however, their eyes too have been opened; and although very few have been able to offer a satisfactory analysis of our economic abnormalities, no serious student of Jewish life can ignore them.

The case of the Jewish people is analogous to that of the patient who has complained of sundry aches and pains for a number of years, but whose physician has not been able to arrive at a satisfactory diagnosis. There was no doubt about the patient’s illness, but in the course of the illness the body developed some measure of resistance to it. As the years progressed and new resistances were built up, the character of the disease changed, new symptoms appeared, and the physician found himself in a continuous state of bewilderment. Likewise, the Jewish nation has not been a passive patient awaiting his inevitable demise. Resistance to the disease has appeared at various times. There has always been the normal effort to regain organic equilibrium. It was not unnatural therefore that the diagnoses of our social "doctors" varied with the morphology of the disease.

Some thirteen or fourteen years ago, one such diagnosis, devised by a group of Jewish Socialists, appeared under the name of non-proletarianization. Its major thesis was that the Jewish proletariat could not be proletarianized. The obvious contradiction contained in the proposition "that the Jewish proletariat cannot be proletarianized," led the Poale Zion, who where the first to develop this theory, to also be the first to renounce it. The Zionist-Socialists (the Z.S.) [Territorial Zionists who split from Poalei Tziyon in 1906, favoring Uganda as a Jewish homeland -- ZOTW]  retained this illogical theory longest. However, they too attempted to remove some of its crudities by converting it into the "non-industrialization" theory.

Jacob Letshinsky, the leading economist of the Z.S., dedicated his book, The Jewish Worker in Russia, to the exposition of this theory. Its major thesis that "the Jewish worker cannot be industrialized" differed only slightly from its prototype. The book, like the principle around which it was built, was an indiscriminate mixture of sound ideas with grave errors.

It is absurd to assert that the Jewish worker cannot be "proletarianized." His being a worker is evident of the fact that he ceased to be an "owner," that he has placed his labor-power on the market, and has ipso facto become a member of the proletariat. The proposition, therefore, that Jewish workers cannot achieve their own proletarianization becomes an even greater absurdity when it comes from a Jewish Socialist Labor Party.

Nor is it less absurd to contend that Jewish labor cannot be industrialized. Jacob Letshinsky complained (in the book mentioned above) that around 1897 there did not exist a single factory which employed a thousand Jewish workers. However, the very handbook of statistics (published by ICA  [Jewish Colonization Association of Baron Rothschild] ) on which he based his work told us (Vol. II, p. 77) of a tobacco factory in Grodno, in the years 1898-99, in which 1,594 Jewish workers were employed. The same factory boasted a steam engine of 36 horse-power. Moreover, the literature of the general and Jewish labor movement in Russia contains detailed accounts of numerous strikes conducted by Jewish workers in the Russian Pale [permitted area of settlement for Jews] of Settlement. The illegal literature of that period (1900-1905) records no less than fifty factories, each employing more than a hundred Jewish workers. The following outstanding examples are also worthy of notice: a millinery factory in Warsaw with 1,000 Jewish employees, a tobacco factory employing 500 Jews, and a glassware factory in Polonoye with 400 Jewish workers.

America opened to the Jewish immigrant even greater opportunities for work than the most highly developed industries in Eastern Europe. No statistics are available concerning Jewish factories in the United States, but of this we are certain: that Jewish labor in America, which is concentrated almost exclusively in the needle industry (in contradistinction to greater diversification of employment in Russia), has definitely assumed the proportions of mass-production that characterize big business. In Paterson, N.J., for example, there are large textile factories with an enormous number of Jewish workers. In Chicago, Rosenwald’s clothing shops employ several thousand Jewish laborers.

It remains true, however, that Jewish industries never attain the large-scale development achieved by non-Jewish industries. No Jewish factory, not even the largest, can compete with such gigantic enterprises as Krupp’s iron works, or Ford’s automobile factories. The Jewish entrepreneur never dreams of industries on this scale, not does the Jewish laborer never dreams of industries on this scale, nor does the Jewish laborer have any access to them.

To be sure, the Jewish masses do become proletarianized; Jewish labor does become industrialized. The process, however, is slow and its development is limited and unilinear. Moreover, Jewish entrepreneurs seem to have a natural tendency to small-scale production. S.O. Margolin, the economist, calls this tendency the individualization of industry. A Jew, possessing meager means, often decides to become a boss "on his own" under circumstances in which a Gentile will never dare undertake such a venture. The Jew will often establish a business or factory with negligible "capital" and thus become a "capitalist." The Gentile will more often choose to remain a "wage-slave" for his entire life, even when his savings are larger than those of his Jewish fellow worker. The enterprising spirit of the Jew is irrepressible. He refuses to remain a proletarian. He will grab at the first opportunity to advance to a higher rung in the social ladder.

This desire to achieve a "success" is a deeply ingrained characteristic of the Jewish laboring masses. Tailors, shoemakers, and cigar-makers eagerly await the opportunity to rid themselves of their tools, and to climb into the higher strata of insurance, dentistry, medicine, law, or into an independent business. This continuous exodus of thousands from the ranks of Jewish labor, and the necessary influx of thousands to replace them, furnishes the explanation for the instability of the Jewish laboring masses.

These peculiar phenomena of Jewish labor have their roots in the general nature of our economic history.

It would be possible to formulate and explain clearly this uniqueness of the Jewish economic past and present, through recourse to the literature of the Poale Zion in Russia before and during the last decade, but we will base our analysis on literature much older than this. Let us begin with a distinction made by Aristotle, whom Marx frequently quotes with much respect (a distinction which Marxists unfortunately have forgotten or neglected.) Aristotle distinguishes between two modes of gaining a livelihood: first, the livelihood gained from nature; and second, the livelihood gained from man. The farmer, mountaineer, or fisherman gains his livelihood from nature; the business man, the banker, or the physician gains his from man.

In terms of this distinction, it is obvious that Jews, in contradistinction to all other nations, derive their livelihood exclusively from man.

We carry our analysis a bit further by availing ourselves of the economic theory of Otto Effertz. He classifies human production on the basis of the share of labor and land (or elements derived directly from land) in it. If we use the farmer as an illustration, there can be no doubt that his work in producing a crop is both difficult and important; nevertheless, the part played by the soil in the production of the crop is greater than that of the human labor involved. The farmer tills, fertilizes, plows, sows, and in the end harvests; but ultimately it is nature that provides the most important factors in the production of the crop. On the other hand, the human labor involved in the production of a garment far exceeds the contributions of nature. The sheep and wool are the products of nature; but from the moment the shears sever the wool from the sheep’s back, and on through the long process of cleaning, spinning, dyeing, and weaving, it is human labor exclusively that brings a piece of cloth to its completion. Nor has labor finished its task before the tailor cuts the cloth and tailors it into a suit of clothes. In this long succession, the contribution of nature is negligible in proportion to the overwhelming demands put on human labor.

In terms of this second distinction we discover that in Jewish production, again in contradistinction to that of all other nations, the proportion of human labor far exceeds the natural elements involved.

This analysis explains why Jewish economics is a "luft" ["air" - based on the Yiddish - from which are derived the comic Yiddish expressions, "luftgescheft" - meaning "air industries or "air business" - business based on nothing substantial, and "luftmench" meaning a person who makes his living from nothing and is tied to nothing -ZOTW]  economics and why Jewish life is a "luft" life. The term luftmensch, was Max Nordau’s contribution to our literature, and it expresses all too well the severance of Jewish labor from the soil. To be sure, no nation’s economic life is founded on land alone. All economic life consists of both elements, land and labor. Indeed, the development of industry is invariably accompanied by an increase in the element of human labor, and a proportional decrease in the elements of nature in production. Although the elements of soil and nature are decreasing in the economic life of other peoples, they are almost absent from Jewish production which is built exclusively on human labor.

Further, within the labor element in production we should distinguish between physical labor and mental labor. It is a commonplace that in Jewish economic life occupations that require mental labor far outnumber those requiring physical labor. Of course, we must not overlook the fact that among other nations, too, the proportion of mental workers increases with the cultural development of the people. In the case of no other nation is the proportion as high as among the Jews.

The capitalist, or entrepreneur contributes mental labor to his enterprise. His work is that of organizing and managing the business. The wage-earner’s contribution consists chiefly of physical labor. The natural gravitation of the Jew toward the occupations that require mental labor exemplifies the entrepreneuring spirit which drives the Jewish laborer to become a small, but independent, business man. The so-called economic individualism is deeply rooted in the landless history of the Jewish people.

To recapitulate: two important phenomena may be observed in Jewish economic production:

(1) The preponderance of the element of human labor over the elements of nature.

(2) The preponderance of mental labor over physical labor.

III

The products of human enterprise are generally divided into three classifications:

(1) Production goods, e.g., machines, raw materials, tools, etc.

(2) Means of communication and transportation, e.g., railways, coaches, wagons, ships, telephone, telegraph, etc.

(3) Consumer goods, e.g., food, clothing, houses, furniture, dishes, books pictures, musical instruments, etc.

Within those classifications of human production, still further divisions may be made, using as a criterion the proximity of a product to, or its remoteness from, nature. The story of the pair of shoes begins with the farmer’s raising and feeding the other craftsmen of the leather industry whose task it is to refine the leather to a specific degree. Finally, out of the hands of the shoemaker emerges the finished product.

Accordingly, we must distinguish in production the following levels:

(1) The primary level of production, in which we include the branches of production nearest nature, e.g. agriculture, gardening, ranching, etc. Here the element of soil, or nature, is preponderant over that of the human labor.

(2) The level of basic industry, in which we include the branches of production nearest nature, e.g., agriculture, gardening, ranching, etc. Here the element of soil, or nature, is preponderant over that of the human labor.

(3) The secondary-middle level of production. This level is even further removed from nature. It includes the metal, building, and textile industries.

(4) The tertiary-middle level of production. In this category we include the chemical industry, the lumber industry, the production of leather, paper, etc. Here we approach the level of the consumer and are still further removed from nature. The occupations of many Jews fall within this category.

(5) The final level of production, which includes the needle-trades, banking, printing, etc., and serves the consumer directly. On this level we find the greatest concentration of the Jews. Here the elements of soil and nature have vanished completely, and human labor is only constituent.

In the light of this classification, let us see what information is obtainable from our statistical tables. In Table I, which is based on the Russian Census of 1897 and the Austrian Census of 1900, Jewish occupations are arranged in the order of their remoteness from nature. The table also furnishes us with the percentages that the Jews constitute in relation to the total numbers employed in the various branches of production. The table reveals the following information:

(a) Jewish occupations are remote from nature. In Russia only 0.6% of those engaged in agriculture are Jews, and in Galicia only 1.5%.

(b) The percentage of Jews in any level of production varies directly with its remoteness from nature. On the level of basic industry, 8 to 9% of the laborers are Jews. On the secondary-middle level the percentage of Jews rises to between 15 and 20. In the tertiary-middle-level it reaches 25 to 33%.

(c) On the final level of production Jewish labor represents 50% of the total; i.e., the Jews have their highest representation in occupations that are at the greater distance from nature.

(d) The vast majority of non-Jews gain their livelihood from nature (in levels 1 and 2, i.e., agriculture and basic industry), whereas the majority of Jews earn their living directly from other men. In Russia and Galicia 70-80% of non-Jews earn their livelihood directly from nature; a similar percentage of Jews earn theirs from men.

These figures are based on official government statistics. They incorporate no Zionist theories and are not motivated by the remotest concern with Jewish problems. The above are the writer’s own classifications. He was compelled to make them for two reasons. First, because occupations are classified differently in Russia and in Austria. Second, because the classifications of the official government statistics are too general; we find, for example, in these government statistics that large scale metallurgy, which rightfully belongs in class 3, and small metal work like that of blacksmith, locksmith, or tinsmith, which rightfully belongs in class 5, are all in one category. Were the official statistics anything better than the indiscriminate jumble that they actually are, they would display the economic condition of the Jewish people much more clearly. Even the veil of official figures, however, cannot obscure the prevailing law of Jewish economics, namely, that the concentration of Jewish labor in any occupation varies directly with the remoteness of that occupation from nature.

It is as if an inexorable whip of history were driving the Jews further and further away from soil and nature, and higher and higher into the insubstantial ether of social stratification; it is as if history had conspired never to liberate the Jews from the shackles of economic landlessness.

The story told by the figures of Table I is that of a people far removed from the most important, most influential, and most stable branches of production — far removed from the occupations which are at the hub of history. Instead of concentrating about the vital center of economic life, the Jews are scattered on its periphery. Obviously, the fate of society does not to any extent rest on the needle or tobacco industries. This superficies of social life, which is made up of the give-and-take of finished goods, must draw its sustenance from labor in such central branches of production as agriculture, sheep-raising, mining, railways, shipping, etc.

The moral of this story told by dry statistics is, that as long as the Jews remain remote from nature and basic industry, Jewish economic life will remain stagnant, Jewish culture will be at a low ebb, and the political welfare of the Jews will remain the plaything of chance. These figures force upon us the inevitable conclusion that in international Socialism, the class struggle, and the revolution, the part played by Jewish Socialism will be as insignificant as the Jewish needle and flatiron are when compared to the non-Jewish tractor, locomotive, or steamship.

Such is the chronic malady of Jewish history. Those who seek to strengthen the attachment of the Jews to the rarefied economic stratosphere of the Galut, those who seek comfort for the Jewish people in Exile songs and Exile hopes merely help to perpetuate our chronic malady.

From this analysis of the chronic economic ailment of the Jewish people in terms of current concepts of economic theory, let us now pass to an analysis of the same group of phenomena in Marxian terms.

TABLE I.
Occupational Distribution of the Jews and Their Percentage in the Total Population of Those Occupations

(Based on the Russian Census of 1897)

 Thank you.

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