Netherlands
(last updated January 2001) |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Introduction and OverviewDuring the 1960s the Dutch constructed a strong European welfare state, above or at the OECD average in government involvement in social protection and in family programs(1). When the traditional nuclear family was rocked by the shifts of the 1960s and 1970s, it was buttressed by an active family policy component of government social policy. However the perspective had gradually shifted by the 1990s. The diversity of family styles and the rise of cohabitation called for a broader reformulation according to Dutch experts reporting to the European Union's family observatory in 1990. Now, with the broad acceptance of "individualization, diversity, and pluralism…Dutch family law has become the most liberal family law in the EU countries and one of the most liberal in the world." Programs and policies are individualized(2). Family life is nonetheless largely traditional. According to Van Den Brekel and Van De Kaa, writing in the mid-1990s, the Netherlands could no longer be described as having an explicit family policy. However, "this does not mean that there is no family-oriented policy at all. Implicitly there is such a policy, but oriented towards all private households, especially the most vulnerable, where one or two adults have to take care of one or more children"(3). But more is at stake. Netherlands has participated in the shift to later marriage ages, increased divorce/separation/non-marital cohabitation and thus declining fertility rates well-below population replacement, all in the context of what it calls "emancipation" of women (more education and labor force participation) and cultural acceptance of diverse family forms and life styles. While not adopting a pro-natalist policy, the Dutch clearly are concerned now about birth rates. Family policy now attempts to offer opportunity for combining parenthood with non-traditional life style options, so that children will not be seen as an impediment and so that women, no longer "content to spend their whole life exclusively caring for the family" will be able to build "a career outside the home…in combination with parental responsibilities"(4). While the Netherlands still has not formalized a family policy, Parliamentary debates, Cabinet responses and official documents (the first in 1995-96), and media discussion suggest something like it, with major focus on "upbringing of children" as the core family characteristic. All of this has occurred during a prolonged belt-tightening period for social expenditures which began with the oil crisis of the early 1970s, only now relaxing somewhat with economic improvement (see below). It also has been accompanied by considerable devolution to municipalities, perhaps creating some unevenness of access and quality in social services(5). Much of the social service delivery system, government funded, is assigned to the private sector (sectarian, or political, or labor, or other civic groupings). |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
HighlightsClick here to view or print country highlights in pdf format. |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Government AgenciesIn the 1960s, according to Van Den Brekel and Van De Kaa: "family policy functioned as an essential part of government welfare policy. In the 1960s there was a separate Directorate for Family Policy at the former Ministry of Culture, Recreation, and Social Work…currently named the Ministry of Welfare, Public Health, and Culture….At that time, the Directorate for Family Policy was a focal point for stimulation and coordinating the policy treatment of family-related issues in the entire government machinery"(6). Now, there is no single focal or coordination point. Most of the child-youth-family programs here in focus now are in the province of either the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment (maternity cash, invalidity, unemployment, income supplementation, survivor benefits, family allowances, social assistance and social minimum income for some groups). The Ministry of Public Health, Welfare, and Sport includes a Directorate for Youth Policy with a social service role and covers in-kind maternity benefits. Education is in a separate ministry. The social security program components are divided among general schemes and employee schemes organized jointly by both of the above ministries. Social assistance, state run, is managed by the municipalities.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Demographic and Other Social TrendsThe Netherlands is a country of some 16 million. Its under-15s were 18.4 percent of the population in 1997, a bit above the European average and its over-65s a bit below. Over 85 percent of children grow up in a family with two married parents. Cohabitation is common, but few remain unmarried at childbirth. Lone mothers headed 16 percent of families with children in 1995, not the highest rate in Europe but above some. Both unmarried mother and teen birth rates are low in country comparisons. The Netherlands long had low female labor force participation rates in all categories but has seen remarkable growth (recession aside), putting it above the EU average now; however 68 percent of this was part-time work in 1998, compared to a 33 percent EU average. Of the lone mothers in the Netherlands, 40 percent were employed compared with 62 percent of the married and cohabitating. Netherlands is clearly in transition. At 1.52 its total fertility rate is among the lowest in OECD but it is similar to a number of European neighbors. Future population growth or decline would seem to depend on the volume of immigration.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Social ProtectionClassified among the continental, "conservative," corporatist welfare states, whose "social partners" (business, labor, government) strive for social and economic policy consensus, rather than conflict, the Netherlands has a social insurance, medical care, education, social assistance, and housing infrastructure which, in turn, sustains a comfortable standard for most residents. Economic fluctuations over the past half century have occasioned policy shifts in the social field, and family policies have been responsive as well to changing demography. While not the most generous country in Europe in social benefits, the Netherlands is at or above the European Union or OECD average on most measures. Its poverty is relatively low, concentrated among single individuals and children. It is progressive in policies and programs and supportive of diversity and individuality. Yet for almost two decades the Dutch income transfer, tax, and medical care systems have been in almost constant "reform," as part of a broader effort to cope with major 1980s economic shocks via cuts in government expenditures "by reducing the public sector wage bill, reducing transfers and lowering the legal minimum wage," all part of a "social partner" consensus strategy which became known as the "Dutch model"(7). A social minimum concept anchored unemployment insurance, assistance, disability and other benefits until it created a cost burden that demanded reform in the 1980s. A flexible eligibility process for disability benefits and cash sickness benefits created un-matched and expensive caseloads as disability became a vehicle for early retirement. Social assistance rules which made no demands on recipients and did little to prevent fraud became a work disincentive, as did generous unemployment benefits. However, reforms enacted in the late '80s (1987) were not regarded as satisfactory as results were assessed and the issues were still on the political agenda in the mid-90s. The context for current family policy is the high European (including youth) unemployment of the mid-90s, the relatively "small" percentage of the Netherlands working-age cohort in employment (85 beneficiaries to 100 workers), concern with social security costs as a drain on the economy, alleged overemphasis on income replacement over prevention and workforce reintegration, easy access to benefits and little incentive to resume employment, easy fraud and system misuse, little incentive for employer and employee organizations to change all of this. The solutions are seen in: a tightening of old age benefits; tougher unemployment insurance eligibility; major disability and sickness benefit reforms to restrict long-term disability (by tougher criteria), cut sickness absenteeism, and create incentives for employers to counsel, guide, and monitor by sharing responsibility and costs. Throughout the system, benefits are made less generous and more income-related. Social assistance is decentralized (but a national social minimum is retained). The Dutch government expends a large percent of the GDP, as is characteristic of the well-developed welfare states, but has successfully kept public employment low. It is among the high taxers (especially via social security contributors). The Netherlands has the 9th highest per capita GDP among 19 OECD countries, and the 9th lowest poverty rate (11.1 percent), using the U.S. poverty line (the U.S. comparable rate being 13.9). According to the more typical international calculation (below half the median income) the Dutch rate was 7.7 percent, the 8th lowest among the 19(8). For more information on the social security systems, labour market regulations, collective bargaining, social and family policies, see the International Reform Monitor.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Child, Youth and Family Policy RegimesMaternity, Paternity, Parental, and Family LeavesThe Netherlands has a 16 week maternity leave at 100 percent wage replacement to a specified maximum. Unemployed women have the right to a lower benefit. There is also a right to a parental leave of 6 months per parent, unpaid, and part-time (20 hours) work is required. It may now be taken until the child is 8 years old, an extension from 4 in 1997.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC)Lone mother employment rates are low and employment by married and cohabiting mothers is growing but still lower than in the Nordic, Anglo-American, and some continental countries (Belgium, France). But the Netherlands is not alone in its group. On the other hand, according to Schulze, only "five percent of all women with children work at a full-time job and only 29 percent of the Dutch believe that women should contribute to the family income, as opposed to 75 percent of all Europeans….Most women stop working when they have their first child; the rest when they have the second child". Schulze reports that only 4 percent of small children attend child care, but 95 percent of the 4's are in pre-school. (Compulsory education begins at 5)(9). Elementary schools have morning and afternoon sessions, so most students go home for lunch; in some places, parents organize in-school luncheon. According to an OECD review, 14% of under-4s were in early care and 98% of 4s by 1999(10). In 1999, lone parents searching for work or undergoing training were made eligible for reimbursement for after-school care costs if their incomes are below a specified level. In an effort to double capacity in non-parental child care, 1999 legislation allowed firms to deduct costs of staff child care facilities from taxation, increased parental deductions for child care costs, and subsidized care for social assistance families.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Family and Child AllowancesIn the context of the history described above, financial support for the family was eroded in the late '70s and '80s but has gradually improved in a series of changes from the early 90s, but earlier generosity has not been recovered. The Netherlands is in the middle of the European Union "league." A complex child allowance system varies the amounts by number of children in the family and a child's age. (Higher benefits for older children). Benefits are universal, government financed and indexed to the price system. The child allowances are available to age 18, but can be extended to 24 if the youth is in vocational training or further education and not entitled to student grants. The allowances are also extended to the age of 24 for those remaining in the parental household and not self-dependent. On the other hand a youth with "serious infirmity" receives the allowance to 17 and then shifts to the special grants for people who cannot work. A 1999 comparative study reported that child allowances cut child poverty by 6.7 percent in the Netherlands, an average result for Europe(11).
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Child and Family Tax BenefitsWith the exception of child care, in limited circumstances, and a lone-parent adjustment, the tax system has no special consideration of families.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Child SupportA new system was inaugurated in 1997. Click here for a detailed description by British researchers. Non-custodial fathers are legally required to support their children, whether born in or out of marriage. Voluntary support agreements and automatic payments are urged but District Courts (guided by rather complex tables) set legally mandated support levels in the absence of agreements or regular payment. If necessary, an official agency undertakes collection and there are systematic mechanisms in place.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Other Child Conditioned Income TransfersThe survivor benefit under social security for full orphans or children reared by widows is income-tested for the mother, not the child. A General Welfare Act, offering generous levels of means-tested social assistance has been curtailed in recent years but still gives important support to single-parent families, the majority of whom receive social assistance. It is in conflict with new interest in encouraging work by this group. There are special, local school-expense benefits for the poor.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Child and Adolescent HealthThere is full population coverage under an insurance system based in sickness funds, and both spouses and dependant children have the same coverage as employees. Higher-income people may opt for private insurance (about one-third). Insurance contributions are required from employer and employee, with the latter covering a far larger portion. Government votes an annual appropriation. The sickness funds contract for doctor, hospital, and druggist services of all kinds. Users are fully covered (with limited dental care). There is no limit on the duration of service but special insurance takes over after a year of hospitalization. Child health services are not unlike the Nordic pattern. For the first four years children (and their mothers) are served in "maternity agencies" ("well-baby" clinics in the U.S. vocabulary). These agencies perform regular check-ups, provide nutritional and child rearing advice, administer the full course of vaccination. By the fourth year, if all is under control, there are semi-annual check-ups. Then there are periodic examinations in school by school doctors working out of the local authority health department. Until the age of 19, children and adolescents are called in for their periodic examinations and 90-100 percent respond. The low poverty, good standard of living and health care system produce good results ("93 percent of all children up to the age of 14 can be considered to be in very good health and only 1 percent is classified as living in bad health")(12). All child health indicators are impressive and the child vaccination rate-like that in a large number of European countries-is exemplary. Youth are all covered by the insurance for general practitioner care. Whereas the boy-girl usage rates are identical to age 15, young women between 15-24 are heavier users (82 percent), a rate largely attributed to visits for contraceptive pill prescriptions (to 16 with parental permission and after 16 without it). Most recently the pill has been classified outside of standard provision and is paid for. In any case, experts reporting to the European Union attribute the low teen-mother rate in Netherlands to the "widely accepted use of contraceptives"(13). |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
School-Aged Children: Policies and ProgramsSchool attendance is compulsory between ages 5-16 but virtually all children attend from 4. Moreover, those not continuing after 16 are required to attend school 1 or 2 days per week until 17. The school system assumes the presence of a mother at home. Schools adjourns for a long lunch break, closing between 3 and 4 P.M. daily and at noon on Wednesday. (Parent committees arrange lunch in some schools and officials do in others). Even secondary schools often have no luncheon service or provision for coverage when teachers are ill. The recent educational "debates" in Holland would be familiar to Americans: gradual decline in the country's educational attainment levels and educational spending compared to others in OECD; concern with rising juvenile crime. The preferred remedies are budget increases, more spending, rapid introduction of computers, more moral education in school. Moreover since children of migrants and of parents with low educational attainment do particularly poorly, there is targeted priority expenditure for them and a new emphasis on pre-school projects(14). New York's Children's Aid Society reports substantial Dutch interest in and replication of its community schools model. Those who continue schooling after 17 are entitled to a variety of grants.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
YouthThere is a special unit for Youth Policy within the Ministry of Culture, Recreation, and Social Work. The "youth participation" theme is emphasized. The phrase "youth policy" in the Dutch literature refers to social services for children and adolescents, usually ages 0-18, covering all services related to problems and disabilities and secondary prevention under the heading "socio-cultural youth work." There is references to 80,000 volunteers, 13,000 staff, all involved in recreation, educational and cultural activities in clubs, centers, neighborhoods, as well as 200,000 volunteers in "ideologically based youth organizations reaching one million children and youngsters" (see Eswin web site). Various statutes and policy statements affirm the right of "youth" from age 12 to be heard in decisions about his or her care and to see the documentation (unless considered "incapable" of evaluating hes/her interests). Age and Rights A chart of age scale for rights and responsibilities, hardly atypical, follows(15).
Click here to view in pdf format a table on the Ages at which children are legally entitled to carry out a series of acts in the European Union. See Youth Policies section for definitions of terms used. |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Reconciliation of Work and Family LifeAccording to one Netherlands representative to the European Union's Family Observatory, there is no debate about reconciling family and work because full-time work for mothers is rare: "Most Dutch are relatively affluent and feel that the family is their private affair….Most educated women prefer to give up their gainful employment to stay home with their children." Thus parental leave is brief and infant/toddler care is rare. But, he adds, it is a "land of two faces." Many mothers do work, if part-time and many of the members of the government are pro-family: "Some ministers leave Parliamentary sessions early to be with their family"(16). During 2000 there was strong parliamentary support for legislation establishing a right to part-time work(17).
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
ReferencesPeter Baldwin, The Politics of Social Solidarity. (Cambridge University Press, 1994). Bertelsman Foundation, ed., International Reform Monitor, Issue 1,2,3 (1999, 2000). Jonathan Bradshaw, et al, Policy and the Employment of Lone Parents in 20 Countries. (England: University of York, 1996). Jonathan Bradshaw, John Ditch, Hilary Holmes, and PeterWhiteford, Support for Children: A Comparison of Arrangements in Fifteen Countries. (London: Department of Social Security, Research Report No. 21, 1993). Peter Cuyvers and Hans-Joachim Schulze, "The Netherlands," in John Ditch, Helen Barnes, and Jonathan Bradshaw, editors, Developments in National Family Policies in 1996. (Brussels: Commission of the European Communities, 1998), pp. 173-192. Joost in't Groen, "The Netherlands: Recent Trends in Cash Benefits," in Niels Ploug and Jon Kvist, editors, Recent Trends in Cash Benefits in Europe (Copenhagen: The Danish National Institute of Social Research, 1994), pp. 103-115. Joop Hartog, "Whither Dutch Corporation? Or: A Turbulent Tango for Market and State," DP # 1197-99 (Madison: Institute for Research on Poverty). Herwig Immervoll, Holly Sutherland, Klaas De Vos, "Reducing Child Poverty in the European Union: The Role of Child Benefits," in Koen Vleminckx and Timothy Sneeding, eds., Child Well-Being, Child Poverty and Child Policy in Modern Nations (Bristol, Eng.: The Policy Press, 2000, forthcoming). Innocenti Report Card, Issue No. 1 (Florence, Italy: International Child Development Centre, June 2000). Sheila B. Kamerman and Alfred J. Kahn, "Investing in Children: Government Expenditures for Children in Western Industrialized Societies, 1960-1990," in Sheldon Danziger and G. Andrea Cornia, eds., Child Poverty in Industrialized Societies (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 1997). John Micklewright and Kitty Stewart, Is Child Welfare Converging in the European Union? (Florence, Italy: UNICEF International Child Development Centre, 1999). Clio Presvelou and Cornelius de Hoog, "Nederland: From 'Family Policy' to 'Equal Opportunities For All,'" in Wilfried Dumon, ed., National Family Policies in EC-Countries in 1990. (Brussels: Commission of the Eruopean Communities, DG V, 1991), p. 46. OECD Country note, "Early Childhood Education and Care Policy in the Netherlands (Paris: 1999). Hans-Joachim Schulze, "Netherlands," The Family Observer, 1999. (Vienna: Austrian Institute for Family Studies), pp.35-6. Johannes C. Van Den Brekel and Dirk J. Van De Kaa, "The Netherlands: Aspects of Family Policy in the Setting of the Second Demographic Transition," in Wilfried Dumon, editor, Changing Family Policies in the Member States of the European Union. (Brussels, Commission of the European Communities, 1995?), pp. 225-254.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Notes1 Kamerman and Kahn, "Expenditures….". |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
ContactsWashington Embassy Embassy of The Netherlands Ministry Mr. Hans Janssen Other Institutions Dr. Peter Cuyvers Mrs. Caroline Vink European Union Family Observatory National Representative Hans-Joachim Schulze |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
