At the beginning of their renewed settlement in the 17th and early 18th century, the Mecklenburg Jews faced the difficult task of feeding their families. As everywhere in their areas of settlement, the Jews as an immigrant minority were restricted to earning their livelihood only with activities that were legally permitted to them or that the long-established population did not wish to pursue for various reasons. The further complication was that Jews were long prohibited from owning real property and their access to the craft guilds had been barred to them from time immemorial. They therefore had no choice but to apply for a letter of protection and an associated privilege and to earn their living through trade. The classic, prejudice-laden image of the Jew as a petty merchant has its roots precisely here. It reverses, however, the reasons for the occupational choices of Jews in the 18th and early 19th century, for they simply had no other option.
They thus had to compete with their own countrymen in narrow economic sectors, which meant that insolvencies were commonplace among them, especially in the small provincial towns. Due to the economic restrictions, most Jews therefore fed their families through the most primitive of trading activities.
Yet even here there were significant differences, reflected in the various types of trading privileges granted: there were the peddlers or hawkers, shopkeepers and the so-called "produce traders".
The peddlers indeed went on foot from door to door in the countryside, carrying packs, offering their wares -- peddlers in the truest sense of the word. The use of a cart was generally not permitted to peddlers, and within the towns they could only conduct their business at fairs. Even though these peddlers initially offered only hides, rags, and other bric-a-brac, Jewish peddling later fulfilled an important role, as they helped rural producers sell their products. The dukes later increasingly restricted peddling, as citizens felt harassed by the sheer number of both Christian and Jewish peddlers, and it was therefore no longer desired in the land. This led as early as 1727 to a government decree restricting peddling. Shopkeeping, in contrast to peddling, represented a slight improvement, as these shopkeepers were permitted to employ an unlimited number of trade assistants. The more privileged "produce trader" was additionally permitted to use a cart for his trade. Typically, he would buy goods in larger quantities in the countryside and later resell them at a profit to retailers in the town.
Furthermore, the "ribbon Jews" also traveled the land -- petty merchants who traded in yarn, needles, buttons, and ribbon, which they frequently carried in a box on their back. An equally typical occupation of the rural Jews of the time was that of the "lottery collector", who traded in lottery tickets and was probably rather a last resort in order to at least meagerly feed one's own family. This activity was a final recourse insofar as it was permitted to sons of protected Jews without special concession.
As far as the larger Mecklenburg cities of Schwerin, Rostock, and Wismar are concerned, trading occupations predominated here as well. Individually, however, there were already early special professional profiles such as court Jews, who frequently managed financial affairs for their lords, or others employed at court, such as the Schwerin court dentist Marcus Bonheim.
With advancing emancipation, the occupations of the Mecklenburg Jews changed in part. Those whom fortune in trade did not favor later became craftsmen or laborers; others were able, through the success of their forebears, to later pursue studies in the major German cities.