Summer is the time for vacation, especially for students who look forward to such activities as camp, sleep, travel, and plain old fun. School…
It Costs Too Much to Convert
There has been much written – including a cover story in this newspaper (Canadian Jewish News) two weeks ago – regarding the placing of…
Fiscal Responsibility
What is it about leaders that so many of them seem to be embroiled in ethical controversy? We in Ontario have a gas-plant scandal that won’t go…
The Four Questions of Jewish Education
I write these words just days before Pesach, the holiday that, more than any other, focuses on children. We are mandated to ensure that every child…
Pushing the Door on Tuition Wide Open
Between the time of my writing my last article on making Jewish high school free and its appearance in the paper, I was thrilled to see the…
Let's Make Jewish High School Free
The recently released Pew report on American Jewry has generated anguished discussion on the future of American Jewry. Some of its key findings…
Day School Tuition Is In the News, with the Canadian Jewish News Reporting on Two Recent Initiatives
Once again, the issue of day school tuition is in the news. The Leo Baeck Day School (North Campus) has announced plans for grants up to $5,000 per…
Tax Evasion
No one likes to pay taxes. Yet taxes are the lifeblood of our society, paying for our security, health, public education and the thousands of other…
Dead Foundation Money
Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney recently called on Canadian corporations to start spending the over 500 billion dollars of cash, “dead…
We Have the Money
As summer approaches, day school parents will soon be getting notifications regarding tuition fees for next year. Undoubtedly, fees will—as…
Corporate Golddiggers
Rarely has an op-ed piece (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/14/opinion/why-i-am-leaving-goldman-sachs.html) generated as much discussion as Greg Smith’…
Nortel Justice System
The mention of Nortel Networks makes many a Canadian cringe. Once the darling of the tech world and the most heavily weighted stock in the Toronto…
Sixty Years and Spending
Tragically, natural disasters are a relatively common occurrence. The scene is relatively familiar: pictures of destruction and death, with pale-…
The End of the Euro
Portugal, Greece, Italy. Who might be next? As Europe and the world fret over the possible collapse of the euro, finance ministers, economists and…
Lessons from Steve Jobs
The saintly sage Rav Yisrael Meir Kagan (the Chafetz Chaim, 1838-1933) once commented that every technological innovation carries within it a moral…
The Value of Uncertainty
The stock market hates uncertainty. This helps explain the wild gyrations of the markets, unable to “decide” whether we are headed for a double-dip…
Income Disparity
One must be “thankful” when the news coming out of Israel is the high price of cottage cheese. As is so often the case, it is a relatively…
RiM Woes
As we have often noted, economic decisions reflect moral choices. As the world economy slowly recovers from near-catastrophe, another potential…