Rabbis Earn More Than Christian Clergy

If I could read Hebrew, I’d be considering a career change :

A Forward survey of the way churches and synagogues raise and spend funds found this pattern across the country: Rabbis are generally paid far more than their non-Jewish counterparts, for reasons having to do with congregation size and the social status of spiritual leaders. At the same time, churches send far more in dues to denominational organizations than do synagogues, since many Christians support their denomination’s broader activities, the “mission work,” through their own churches.

Studies sponsored by the Reform and Conservative movements indicate much higher levels of compensation for rabbis. The median base salary, including a housing stipend, for a senior Reform rabbi in 2008 was $146,582 for congregations of 351- to 650- member units, according to a study conducted jointly by the Union for Reform Judaism and the Central Conference of American Rabbis, the Reform rabbinical group. The median salary for rabbis of very large Reform synagogues, with more than 1,000-member units, was $230,000.

A 2009 survey by the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism found that the average salary for Conservative senior rabbis of congregations with 400 to 599 member units was $137,000, not including housing stipends. The average salary for rabbis of very large Conservative synagogues, with more than 1,000-member units, was $207,000, not including housing. No such statistics are available for Orthodox rabbis.

As the articles notes, Catholic priests make an average of $25,000 a year while Protestant ministers average $40,000.

Mark Oppenheimer thinks the results are skewed by wealthy congregations: “[T]he rabbi average salary is brought WAY up by the gross overpayment that wealthy synagogues make to their overpaid, lap-of-luxury rabbis. Hundreds of thousands of dollars. Perhaps more, although we can’t get those figures. Lots of rabbis at smaller or struggling temples and synagogues are underpaid, or not paid.”