Posted on 06/22/2014 5:22:47 AM PDT by amnestynone
In 2012, the average New York Jew looks a little less like Jerry Seinfeld and a little more like Tevye the Milkman.
New York’s Jews are poorer, less educated and more religious than they were 10 years ago, according to a landmark new study of the city’s Jewish population.
They’re also less liberal: More than half of the Jews in New York City live in Orthodox or Russian-speaking homes, both of which lean heavily conservative.
The study, conducted by UJA-Federation of New York, counted 1.5 million Jews in New York City, Long Island and Westchester, up from 1.4 million just 10 years ago. That growth is almost entirely due to a huge surge in New York’s Orthodox population, which rose by more than 100,000 people over the past decade.
Related •N.Y. Jewish Population Grows to 1.5M: Study •U.S. Jewish Population Pegged at 6 Million •'The Era of the So-Called Jewish Vote Is Over' The numbers point to a seismic shift in what it means to be a New York Jew as Manhattan’s Jewish population shrinks and Brooklyn’s explodes, and as people disaffiliate from the more liberal Jewish denominations.
Source: UJA-Federation of New YorkIn the five boroughs of New York City itself, 40% of Jews currently identify as Orthodox.
The fast-shifting figures promise looming changes in how Jewish political power is wielded in New York, and in the relative influence of the city’s long-standing non-Orthodox institutions.
These trends are poised to accelerate. While one-third of New York-area Jews are Orthodox today, six out of 10 Jewish children in the New York area live in Orthodox homes. Hasidic children alone constitute 37% of the area’s Jewish children.
“We have a community that is large, that is growing, that is diverse and that is challenged by poverty, by elements of disengagement, and also strengthened by diversity, by growing areas of Jewish involvement,” said Steven M. Cohen, a leading sociologist of the Jewish community and one of the report’s three authors.
The $1.7 million study is the largest of its kind ever undertaken in the United States, according to its sponsors. Researchers conducted 6,000 telephone interviews with Jewish households, randomly selected using a variety of methods.
(This reporter’s mother sat on a 22-member advisory board that approved the design of the survey in the fall of 2010. She has had no involvement in the study over the past year and a half.)
The survey’s findings pose an array of major challenges to the city’s Jewish establishment. The survey found among New York Jews fast-rising levels of poverty that appear to be unparalleled in recent history. Researchers also found a steep drop in affiliation among non-Orthodox Jews, and low levels of support among Orthodox Jews for the institutions that the non-Orthodox have long dominated. The survey also identified demographic trends that could have consequences for how New York Jews’ political interests are defined.
Less Liberal
Taken together, New York City’s Orthodox and Russian-speaking Jewish communities comprise 56% of the city’s Jewish population.
The newfound dominance of those communities, both of which are more politically conservative than other Jewish groups, could challenge the notion that the New York Jewish vote is a liberal vote — or even a Democratic vote.
“The Russians are not Democrats, and the Hasidim are not necessarily Democrats,” said Hank Sheinkopf, a conservative Democratic political strategist. “When somebody figures out how to put the Russians and the ultra-Orthodox together they’re going to come up with an atomic bomb in Democratic politics in New York State.”
What BS the vast majority read the NY Times and are forever Democrats
Yeah, the 'Black Pastors,' an eclectic group to be sure, turned on their down-low brother for a good 15 minutes before urging their congregations to vote for the SOB, keeping African-American support at the 100% ... or better ... mark!
Surprise surprise! Perhaps more surprising, 53% of Catholic voters supported the Post-Term Abortionist-in-Chief.
Who are more personally conservative in their private lives than working class Catholics, Orthodox Jews, or hard- working African-American families? Yet all traditionally support Democrats who govern in direct opposition to their private moral principles.
Furthermore, I have personally heard members of the aforementioned groups viciously attack the Republicans, using stupid socialist clichés and rhetoric that might have made some small sense if said against the Czar's government during a pogrom in 1890's Russia
O no doubt. I didn't mean to let Pope Pius IX off the hook.
Now that they have been identified, they will be attacked by the marxists and if need be destroyed.
Agree.
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Possibly a reason behind the effort to ship a lot of those illegal children being held in the SW to NYC?
Heads were being scratched about that, last week. But using them to counterbalance a rightward political shift by NYC Jewish citizens would make sense in a way that would appeal to guys like Di Blasio ...
European socialism has its roots in 18th century French thought. Babeuf etc...
In some parts of the City, Jews’ve been voting Republican for decades. Why? We don’t all have a death wish, only most of the rich, assimilated ones.
“In some parts of the City, Jews’ve been voting Republican for decades. Why? We don’t all have a death wish, only most of the rich, assimilated ones.”
On the contrary it is the Orthodox 40% of whom live under the poverty level who vote Republican. The rich Jews are Democrats
“only most of the rich, assimilated ones.”
Oh I see you are saying the rich assimilated ones are Democrats. Sorry, I misunderstood. I am glad to see you are with us.
Sorry. I reckon I overlooked all those proto-Republican Clubs in the shtetls of the Pale.
What the study indicates are demographic trends some people here have been picking up on for some time. These trends appear to be favorable to the GOP in NY State (the survey takes in some NYC suburbs as well). A significant movement to the GOP by the state's Jewish voters could happen, but one necessary factor will be for the state and local GOP parties to actively cultivate and organize the potential vote here. This article should serve as wake-up call to them. But unfortunately, for the better part of a decade now, the New York state Republican organization seems to have been missing in action, generally speaking.
As a Jewish conservative, I would say you are reading a bit too much into it, but it doesn't imply you're paranoid.
Please see my post # 53.
Please see my post # 53.
It wasn't Orthodox (for the most part) or Hasidic Jews that were involved with European socialism. And, just in case you didn't know, Karl Marx was NOT Jewish, but raised in the German Lutheran church. In fact some of Marx's writings are unmistakably anti-Semitic.
Please see my post # 53.
Unfortunately, you are right. But there also is a larger than average degree of entrepreneurial spirit among the Chasidim. And if you meet a Hasid who is in favor of gay marriage, please let us know.
He lost less than 1% of the black vote over that. I will believe it when I see it.
Don't think of black voting trends in the same breath with orthodox Jewish and ultra-orthodox Jewish voting trends. Interests are quite different and there has been all too much tension between them in urban areas in the past several decades.
I hope you are correct, but like I said: I will believe it when I see it.
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