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August 3, 2001/Av 14, 5761, Vol. 53, No.43
Finding a better use of our rebate
BARRY COHEN
Editor
In the coming weeks, many Americans will get tax-rebate checks - $300 for single taxpayers, $500 for heads of households and $600 for married couples filing jointly. What will we do with the money?
One option is buying things. I could walk into the men's department of Robinson's May and purchase a suit, shirt, tie and shoes for $500.
Another option is investing the money. Assuming an 11.5 percent gain, I could place $600 in an IRA, and in 20 years have $5,292 pre-tax or $2,763 after tax.
A third option is to give it away. Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations of the Reform Jewish Movement, advocates donating our rebate checks to charity. In a statement, Yoffie said, "This tax bill, which disproportionately benefits the wealthiest segment of society, will place in jeopardy the future of the Medicare trust fund, Social Security and social service programs."
Becca Hornstein, executive director of the Council for Jews with Special Needs in Phoenix, said my $600 would pay for 24 hours of sign language interpreters for children, teens and adults. Or it could also cover the salaries of assistants to help two children attend summer camp for a week.
Another nonprofit, Crisis Nursery, where my wife Jennifer is development director, provides shelter and care for children from abusive or potentially abusive homes. A $600 donation would provide a one-week supply of diapers, bottles, formula, paper goods and other necessities for the 36 children living there.
Our decision of what to do with our refund checks might be guided by who most needs the money. I don't need new clothes, another tennis racket or more jazz CDs. If I can save $150 or $200 a year on my own for 20 years, I'll reap the same rewards as putting the refund check in an IRA account.
Children attending summer camp or infants needing safe surroundings will receive the benefits of our tzedakah here and now, and the positive effects will continue far in the future.
Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, writes: "As Deuteronomy teaches, 'Open your hand to the poor and needy kinsman in your land.' ... In passing a $1.35 trillion tax cut, the administration and members of the United States Congress decided instead to open the hands of the government to the wealthy and to forsake the needy in our land."
When we give our refund checks to the needy in our land, we are living by Jewish teachings. Further, we are participating in our nation's social contract, an unwritten agreement stipulating the health of our society depends not on my personal needs but on how we as a nation respond to one another's needs.
Tzedakah is often mistranslated as "charity." A more accurate translation is "righteousness." Donating our refund checks to non-profit agencies is a righteous act that improves the quality of life of those easiest to overlook but most needing our care.
Those who benefit from our example may one day perform their own acts of tzedakah to help others in the same way we once helped them. The result is an interconnected, interdependent, righteous society.
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