Hi. This is in response to your question to Radical Reference about the rate of social service use by Orthodox Jews in New York City. I'm sorry it's taken me so long to get back to you. I'm afraid I wasn't able to find a figure for how many Orthodox Jews in New York City use social services, but I have found some resources and figures that I think will be of use to you in thinking about or further investigating the issue.
First, we need to think about the question: What exactly is a 'social service claimant', what would make someone one? Some social services are only partially funded by the government or entirely privately funded, and it's not entirely clear what counts as a social service and what doesn't. I was curious to see the Community Service Society report you mention, to see how they were defining who was a social service claimant, but I'm afraid I couldn't find it. So, in my search, I kept my eye out for any statistics about 'social service claimants', but focused more on the idea of 'public aid recipients,' because I had a better handle on that and thought it would be easier to find figures.
The Statistical Handbook on Racial Groups in the United States (2000 edition) has some figures for public aid, but it's figures mostly only seperate out the standard 'racial' groups, and do not include Jews as a category, let alone Orthodox Jews. But from there I can tell you that as of those figures, 14% of all Americans receive "Major Means-Tested Assistance Programs", which included AFDC, General Assistance, SSI, Food Stamps, Medicare, and Housing Assistance. To give an idea that there are racial disparities there, the figure was 8.7% for non-hispanic whites, and 35.5% for blacks. The source for these figures was given as as the US Census Current Population Survey. By following up on that, we could probably get a figure for just NYC, but not for Orthodox Jews: The US census does not ask questions about religion, as a matter of law. [http://ask.census.gov/cgi-bin/askcensus.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=29] So I didn't follow up on that.
The Statistical Handbook on Racial Groups also had figures for some other public aid programs not included as a 'major means-tested assistance program', including the subsidized school lunch program. Interestingly, 42% of all households in the US participate in the subsidized school lunch program! If participating in that program qualified one as a 'social service claimant', then 50% might not be a high figure for Americans generally!
While the census doesn't have figures for religion, one very good source of religious statistics is the American Religion Data Archive, which can be accessed online for free at http://www.thearda.com/. The web site has an excellent survey, and allowed me to discover that the General Social Survey (2002 is the latest one in the Archive) not only asks religion, but specifically asks Jews to choose among Orthodox, Conservative, etc. The data there could tell us the average income of Orthodox Jews, but the General Social Survey doesn't seem to ask about public aid receipt or social service use.
A good source for statistics on NYC specifically is the New York State Statistical Yearbook (http://www.nysstatistics.org/yearbook/04/section_k.htm), but it did not appear to contain a figure for social service or public aid use by Orthodox Jews specifically.
It may be that nobody has collected the data neccesary to come up with this figure, or that they aren't sharing it. Some Orthodox Jewish community organizations or social service agencies may have this figure, but as far as I can tell they aren't sharing it with the public. Or, the figure may be out there somewhere and I just couldn't find it. Next time someone makes such an assertion, ask if they have a source (and let me know if they do!).
But it's also worthwhile to think about what the actual meaning or political implications of this assertion are. You suggest that it is a "dirty little secret" and "potentially defamatory"--but what exactly is pejorative about this claim? Presumably it's not just that a high portion of Orthodox Jews in NYC may be needy. (Which could very well be the case; we could attempt to research that too). I'm guessing the accusation is something along the lines of an imagined "Welfare Rabbi" stereotype, like the "Welfare Mother" stereotype used by the Right to paint a negative picture of a certain sort of welfare recipient. Perhaps the accuser is suggesting that a large number of Orthodox Jewish men in NYC are unemployed, studying as a full time longterm lifestyle, and collecting public aid to support this. However, the number of Orthodox Jewish public aid recipients in NYC wouldn't actually tell us this either way---we wouldn't know how many Orthodox Jews in NYC are in fact full-time students (as a lifetime commitment, or just temporarily), or what percentage of those have no other sources of income, or recieve public aid. Or what percentage of Orthodox Jewish full-time students collecting public aid would likely be eligible for public aid even if they weren't full-time students. (I'm afraid I couldn't find figures for any of that either though, not even the number of full-time Yeshiva students in NYC.) So even if we had verification for the figure you heard claimed, it wouldn't neccesarily mean what the claimer may have been suggesting it meant.
You also mention that "apparently, this is an issue of concern in Israel as far as the state supporting religious study." The issue of 'special rights' for the Orthodox (generally called 'Haredi' in Israel) is sometimes a controversy in Israel, but it usually isn't over public aid to individuals---in fact, the government of Israel directly subsidizes religious schools, so if people want to complain about state support for religious study, they can complain about a more obvious case. Here is a long article on "Freedom of Religion in Israel" by Shimon Shetreet, that addresses the Israeli's government involvment with religion and how that is sometimes controversial:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Society_&_Culture/freedom.html
The U.S. Department of State's "2004 Annual Report on International Religious Freedom", in the Israel Section, also addresses some of these issues. See Section 5 particularly:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/relisrael04.html
Here's an article from the Jerusalem Post that argues against the idea that the Orthodox in Israel are taking more than their 'fair share'. (Essays arguing that they the Orthodox in Israel do get unfair subsidies can be found too; is indeed a controversy).
http://www.jewishmediaresources.com/article/564/
The most well-known instance of this kind of controversy involving accusations of unfair government support for Orthodox Jews in the US is probably the case of Orthodox town of Kiryas Joel in New York State, where there was controversy about funding for a public school district that was 100% Orthodox Jews. You can probably find some information about that on Google, or we can find more information on that issue if you have trouble.
And finally, one book about Orthodox Jewish Yeshiva students in New York that you might find useful is "The World of the Yeshiva: An Intimate Portrait of Orthodox Jewry" by William B Helmreich, 2000 edition. I haven't looked at this book myself, however.
Whew, so that was an awfully long answer. I hope some of this information has been useful to you; sorry I wasn't able to find the exact figure you were looking for. If Radical Reference can be of any further assistance, please feel free to ask another question at www.radicalreference.info.
--Jonathan