"It is impossible to talk about economics and social justice without someone creating added value in the economy - and it is the private sector that creates it," said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the "Globes" Israel Business Conference today in a comment about the social protest.
"People think that economics runs itself, Growth is mostly achieved by the private sector. Those who forget this will find themselves in East Germany or North Korea, or with five-year plans that make just distribution and end up with terrible poverty. In the 20th century, there was an experiment between the free and the unfree economies, and we learned a lesson - free economies meet society's needs."
Netanyahu attacked his critics and the people calling for social justice, saying that they "only talk about how to distribute the pie, but not how to make it bigger. If you're only engaged in distribution, you'll very quickly be left only with crumbs. I tell you that I am dealing with the question how to make the pie bigger. By the way, when the pie gets bigger and the distribution gets better."
"Our pie grows when the world grows. We're an export-oriented economy and our key markets are not about to grow in the near future. Our ability to continue to grow is in doubt, unless we do some new things. What are these new things? First of all, to reach new markets. The finance minister is leaving for India today with my blessing. President Peres recently visited Vietnam with my blessing. We're talking about trips to China with my consent and at my initiative. I tell any minister who wants to go to China, 'Go'. I tell you too, 'Go to China'. Why? Because it's a huge market and if we get a small piece of it we'll achieve the growth that is so critical to our needs."
