Are There Too Many Yeshiva Bochurim?

Are there too many young Israeli men learning in Yeshiva [and Kollel] in Eretz Yisrael? Yes!

Before you close the window, please hear me out.

I am not saying exactly how many are too many, and I can’t think of any names or faces, myself, I would say this to directly, and I’m certainly not suggesting any of the traditional solutions to the question, and there will never be too many Yeshivos, but as a theoretical answer to the question, the correct answer is: Yes, there must necessarily be too many.

How do you know?

Easy: Torah study is being subsidized, and not privately but publicly. It is a priori obvious, just as Higher Education subsidies mean universities are overfull, and the IDF’s funding and forcible conscription mean those institutions are overfull.

So what?

So Chazal themselves say one who doesn’t see success in his learning after 3\5 years should go work. Maybe this is also what they meant about Hashem crying over those cannot learn but do so anyway.

But don’t we hear the “street” is too dangerous today so all and sundry must spend a few years in Yeshiva first?

This was said about sixty years ago. I don’t see the evidence this is still the case. There are many median solutions to Torah study, instead of full-time Yeshiva. The same is true for Kollel.

There is more to say; another time.