Some people like to think that business is business and
business decisions made by businessmen are purely rational,
economic choices. Professor Daniel Kahneman won a Nobel prize
for proving that choices are not always rational. We could
offer the experience of the chareidi community — both
good and bad — as further proof.
A case in point is the recent retirement of Dan Propper after
25 years as head of Osem Food Industries, and a total of 40
years with the company. Propper, who is from the founding
family of Osem, oversaw the growth of Osem from sales of tens
of millions of dollars to its current level of over $600
million a year. Its stock rose smoothly and steadily,
proceeding almost as if it were a high-yielding bond,
returning over 144 percent in a decade, without any apparent
risk. His tenure is considered an unqualified success.
Almost alone among Israel's major companies, Osem under
Propper conducted itself within the letter and the spirit of
halochoh, in ways that went far beyond the minimum necessary
to get chareidi business — which is the standard that
most of the better Israeli companies follow (the worse ones
try to be seen as halachic while cutting corners and cheating
at every opportunity).
Osem always had a strong, responsible company rov —
originally HaRav Yitzchok Meir Charlap zt"l and then
his son HaRav Yaakov Moshe Charlap — who commanded
respect in outside circles due to his knowledge and
integrity, and who was consulted and made a party to all the
workings of the company.
The deep commitment expressed itself in many ways. Just
recently in the middle of constructing a giant distribution
facility in the Modi'in area near Shoham, a burial cave was
discovered on the site. As soon as the issue arose, the
company agreed to bear the cost of the proffered halachic
solution.
During shmittah, Osem's products were always available
to the mehadrin community. Even though it was
pressured to use the hetter mechirah, it manufactured
its products under the limitations of the strict
shmittah observance standards — and showed that
it could be done by a major food producer.
A similar issue is the sale of chometz by food
companies. Several years ago Maran HaRav Eliashiv
shlita ruled that all such sales should be legally
binding and enforceable transactions, with ironclad fines
that would apply if any of the provisions of the sale were
challenged in any forum. There was a concern that the
officers of the companies viewed the sale of chometz
as a purely religious ceremony with symbolic value, but
nothing more. This concern was reinforced when some companies
balked at signing the new tough sale contracts, but Osem was
one of the first large concerns that accepted all the new
conditions.
Osem is an example of what we see as good will, since the
company went considerably beyond what minimal business
calculations would dictate. We have also, in other companies,
seen cases of what was clearly bad will, which in the end was
overcome by the power of the purse.
One recent case is that of cell phones. When the rabbinical
panel first made its demand for phones that met its basic
specifications of being an instrument whose function is
limited to talk, the major companies said that they could not
do it. The community stood behind the rabbinical demands,
including the chareidi media which refused to accept any
advertising for non-approved cell phones. Yated can
attest that this involved a significant sacrifice on our
part. Three of the four large companies eventually agreed,
and recently the fourth — which had publicly insisted
that it would not "capitulate" — announced that it was
beginning negotiations with the rabbonim.
Another minor success is the recent decision of El Al to
install personal screens for its inflight movies, making it
much easier for passengers not to watch them. El Al was one
of the last airlines to have large screens. We do not know
why, but we do know that chareidi passengers have been asking
them to make the change for years.
The Israel Electric Company (IEC) still insists on
controlling the production of electricity on Shabbos in a way
that necessitates human intervention. The technology exists
to avoid this, and it operates in many plants around the
world where Shabbos is not even a factor. Perhaps there is an
economic logic to the behavior of the IEC, but it escapes us
— though we suggest that perhaps if the chareidi
parties can pass a law removing the incentive of overtime pay
for work on Shabbos it may go a long way towards promoting
Shabbos observance in Israel.
Yes, there is still a lot of work to do. However, the
unfettered marketplace, especially in Eretz Yisroel,
can work to our advantage.
