Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Living in the Netherlands

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    Living in the Netherlands

    One of my sons is living in Maastricht studying various languages and generally experiencing a different culture, as you do. He told me a couple of things today that sound a bit wrong and I wonder if anyone might be able to confirm or deny the truth of them.

    He's working as a cleaner in order to pay the bills and he tells me that he pays 33% tax with no tax threshold i.e. on everything he earns' does this sound correct? He is also facing some medical expenditure, new glasses and about 900 Euros of dental work, are these areas all privately provided? He has some medical insurance but he doesn't seem to think either of these things are covered. Any advice appreciated it would be nice to think that the bank of dad isn't going to have to become the lender of last resort again.

    #2
    Living in the Netherlands

    The 33% sounds about right, I had a mate working there last year and remember him saying they do pay at that rate (with no tax-free allowance like we enjoy here). But part of the reason it's that high is that most of it is the mandatory state medical premium, which I'd have assumed was to cover bills of the sort you go on to mention?

    Comment


      #3
      Living in the Netherlands

      Smallcaps to thread?

      Comment


        #4
        Living in the Netherlands

        GHE,

        I've just sent you a pm.

        Comment


          #5
          Living in the Netherlands

          There is a tax threshold, but it's tiny. The first 1600 euros in a year is tax free I think.

          Otherise, yes, tax rises quite quickly. And rich people pay hardly any tax because mortgage payments are income tax deductable. Almost every millionaire in Holland has a sham plc that they stick their money in, which they then take a mortgage from on the most crappy terms possible, in order to maximise their income tax deduciton.

          In the 90s, health care, dental care, hearing aids, contraception, etc were all provided for by the state. About 15 years ago they privatised the health insurance system and, since then, health costs have gone through the roof as a % of GDP. But the main thing is that the middle class are bearing the costs now, as opposed to the plutocrats and the corporations. It's the system Fine Gael proposes for Ireland.

          And the middle class keep voting for that Thatcherite VVD.

          Comment


            #6
            Living in the Netherlands

            Eye to eye, station to station

            Comment


              #7
              Living in the Netherlands

              ad hoc wrote: Eye to eye, station to station
              Came here to say this.

              Comment


                #8
                Living in the Netherlands

                Sits wrote: Smallcaps to thread?
                Reporting!

                I've been out of the country since mid-2013, so the following information may have missed some recent changes. But from my memory, the combined efforts of Rogin and AP hit the nail on the head. Losing roughly 33% of one's earnings to taxes is common.

                Dutch health care comes with something called an "eigen risico" (no idea if the concept translates, so I'll just keep it in Dutch), which means that every year there is a set amount of money you have to cough up first before insurance takes over payment*. For 2015, this threshold lies at 375 euros. However, if you want lower insurance premiums, you can opt to raise the threshold by 100-500 euros, which is a sensible move if you can reasonably expect not to get ill (for instance if you're a healthy young person).

                Beyond the eigen risico, whether the insurance will pay for what you need depends on what insurance policy you have selected. There is a basic package of care products that all policies have to cover details here, sadly only in Dutch, and as you can imagine the cheapest available policies do not go one step beyond this package. Particularly, standard dental care and checks (for anyone over 18) are not covered by the basic package; you typically need to opt for an optional extra insurance package to get that covered.

                GHE, it depends on which insurance policy your son has at which insurer, but his story does sound probable to me.

                * some very basic kinds of health care are excused from this ruling; insurance will pay for these regardless of whether you've reached the threshold. These include GP care, maternity care, care for certain chronic diseases, but glasses and dental work are definitely not included.

                Comment


                  #9
                  Living in the Netherlands

                  I think that threshold is best described as a deductible (or excess in UK insurance terminology, I think - although it's a few years since I was translating German insurance software and the terms referred to car insurance, so that might not be 100% accurate in this case).

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Living in the Netherlands

                    Apparently dental insurance isn't worth your while anyway, because it is more a wear and tear kind of thing, like getting car tyres changed. Tooth decay happens to nearly everyone and the insurance companies know it...

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Living in the Netherlands

                      Eigen risico would literally be "own risk", but it is indeed a "deductible" in American insurance speak.

                      And for what its worth, the figures are very low by standards over here, where deductibles are regularly in the thousands.

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Living in the Netherlands

                        That's a nice deal the rich in Holland have there, what with getting out of NI-equivalent payments over 50,000 euros, meaning that the effective tax rate is 33, 42, 42, and 52 percent. Even discounting that mortgage interest deductible scheme (which I'm led to believe can basically never be repealed, as everyone in the Randstad is up to debt to their eyeballs due to high house prices*, so crashing the housing market would burst the dike of the Dutch economy).

                        *My auntie has a lovely old 2 bedroom house in Koudekerk aan den Rijn, a small village where nothing ever happens. It's on the Rijn itself. Her husband and her bought it for about the equivalent of 140,000 euros 20 years ago and it's worth 650,000 now.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Living in the Netherlands

                          In my early 20s, my main subjects of fascination were NS class 1500 locomotives and grass strip tractor pulling.

                          When I finished my degree, I was delighted to find that I could combine both of these interests in the Dutch town of Venlo. It is located on the German border and was the end point for the 1500 hauled Den Hague services, and through relentless watching of Eurosport, it was identified as being within 30km of three international tractor pulling events.

                          I therefore enrolled at Venlo Fontys Hogescholen to do an MSc in International Logistics. EU funding meant I got a 12k grant and further sponsordhip off a UK aereated concrete block supplier as long as I did my thesis on them "An investigation into the logistical implications of the future procurement of pulverised fuel ash with special reference to Thermalite UK".

                          Anyway, the college provided me with a room in a student flat. This was situated between a sex shop, a Turkish coffee shop and was above a butchers converted into an art gallery that got busted for money laundering at least four times when I was there.

                          It was also located ten minutes from the nearest grocery store or bakery. This meant most mornings, faced with the onerous task of going to get bread and milk, I would more regularly visit each of the neighbours in turn and get some noxious skunk and whatever grot mag the other neighbour had in their bargain bin. I then generally wouldn't make it out of the house again until the next morning.

                          The college course was otherwise populated by Scandinavians dodging national service who couldn't speak any English, which was a bit of a hinderance as that was the language it was taught in. This meant coursework was of a primary school level.

                          As time went on, a number of life changing events occured:-
                          - The 1500s were withdrawn
                          - I moved on to the European Truck Racing championship as one of the Finns on the course was friends with twice runner up Jokke Kallio.
                          - The sex shop bargain bin started to consist solely of vast quantiites of two magazines; the rather disturbing 'women sucking dogs cock', or the more mundane 'St Pauli wives'. I can resolutely state I never even looked at the former but did get quite into the latter. How they managed to get a quite lengthy series of magazines just about willing females in a Hamburg suburb, I don't know, but they did. It has made subsequent visits to Schleswig-Holstein region somewhat uneasy.

                          Anyway, the purpose of this little back story, is that whilst your son may not be living an identical lifestyle (for a start, there are no loco hauled passenger services in Maastricht), I don't remember any of this income tax/health insurance nonsense from my time there. Quiz him very harshly and ask to see his cheque book stubs.

                          Comment


                            #14
                            Living in the Netherlands

                            Many thanks for the various responses - they have pretty much clarified my original concerns - I had wondered whether his employer was pulling a fast one on the tax rate and lining their own pockets. He's going to have to do some research on the dental and optical front to see whether it is worth upping his cover.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Living in the Netherlands

                              BB&F, was it their English origin that attracted you to the NS 1500s or some intrinsic appeal?

                              These obsessives have preserved 1501.

                              Comment


                                #16
                                Living in the Netherlands

                                I was born there but I left all that take and insurance stuff to mom and dad.

                                The health care insurance has always been private, in the old days if you earned less than a certain level of salary (about 50K euros or there about IIRC) you paid Ziekenfonds which was state controlled health care insurance but not state funded. So the ziekenfonds companies were private companies but what they could charge was legislated. Above that threshold you had to have private insurance.

                                The system was changed around the turn of the century to what they refer to as "the English system", which is a bit more NHS-like.

                                Eigen risico just means "own risk". You chose your own risk, from 0 to about 3000 Euros per year, and you pay the medical bills you get up to that level and then they pay the rest. Obviously the amount you pay per month depends on the level of own risk. You can choose a package that includes dental care and physiotherapy - or not whatever you want.

                                33% probably doesn't just refer to income tax, there are a whole raft of national and local taxes you pay that would certainly add up to 33%. My parents paid about 50% and they were by no means rich. You do get good value for money though with your Dutch taxes,

                                Most wealthy Dutch people buy a home in Belgium and pretend to live there, they were always the ones with the Mercs with Belgian plates parked on the P.C. Hooftstraat.

                                Comment


                                  #17
                                  Living in the Netherlands

                                  Big Boobs and FIRE! wrote: In my early 20s, my main subjects of fascination were NS class 1500 locomotives and grass strip tractor pulling.

                                  When I finished my degree, I was delighted to find that I could combine both of these interests in the Dutch town of Venlo. It is located on the German border and was the end point for the 1500 hauled Den Hague services, and through relentless watching of Eurosport, it was identified as being within 30km of three international tractor pulling events.

                                  I therefore enrolled at Venlo Fontys Hogescholen to do an MSc in International Logistics. EU funding meant I got a 12k grant and further sponsordhip off a UK aereated concrete block supplier as long as I did my thesis on them "An investigation into the logistical implications of the future procurement of pulverised fuel ash with special reference to Thermalite UK".

                                  Anyway, the college provided me with a room in a student flat. This was situated between a sex shop, a Turkish coffee shop and was above a butchers converted into an art gallery that got busted for money laundering at least four times when I was there.

                                  It was also located ten minutes from the nearest grocery store or bakery. This meant most mornings, faced with the onerous task of going to get bread and milk, I would more regularly visit each of the neighbours in turn and get some noxious skunk and whatever grot mag the other neighbour had in their bargain bin. I then generally wouldn't make it out of the house again until the next morning.

                                  The college course was otherwise populated by Scandinavians dodging national service who couldn't speak any English, which was a bit of a hinderance as that was the language it was taught in. This meant coursework was of a primary school level.

                                  As time went on, a number of life changing events occured:-
                                  - The 1500s were withdrawn
                                  - I moved on to the European Truck Racing championship as one of the Finns on the course was friends with twice runner up Jokke Kallio.
                                  - The sex shop bargain bin started to consist solely of vast quantiites of two magazines; the rather disturbing 'women sucking dogs cock', or the more mundane 'St Pauli wives'. I can resolutely state I never even looked at the former but did get quite into the latter. How they managed to get a quite lengthy series of magazines just about willing females in a Hamburg suburb, I don't know, but they did. It has made subsequent visits to Schleswig-Holstein region somewhat uneasy.

                                  Anyway, the purpose of this little back story, is that whilst your son may not be living an identical lifestyle (for a start, there are no loco hauled passenger services in Maastricht), I don't remember any of this income tax/health insurance nonsense from my time there. Quiz him very harshly and ask to see his cheque book stubs.
                                  I love this.

                                  Comment


                                    #18
                                    Living in the Netherlands

                                    ursus arctos wrote: BB&F, was it their English origin that attracted you to the NS 1500s or some intrinsic appeal?

                                    These obsessives have preserved 1501.
                                    1. Metro Vic
                                    2. 1500v DC without thyristor or chopper control. crunch crunch goes the switchgear.
                                    3. Only six of them.
                                    4. Pretty solid on the route so easy to build up some mega mileages behind them.
                                    5. Being able to go bashing in the 80s without the Head bag and Campri jacket that the UK scene was making cumpulsory.

                                    Comment


                                      #19
                                      Living in the Netherlands

                                      Flynnie wrote: That's a nice deal the rich in Holland have there, what with getting out of NI-equivalent payments over 50,000 euros, meaning that the effective tax rate is 33, 42, 42, and 52 percent. Even discounting that mortgage interest deductible scheme (which I'm led to believe can basically never be repealed, as everyone in the Randstad is up to debt to their eyeballs due to high house prices*, so crashing the housing market would burst the dike of the Dutch economy).

                                      *My auntie has a lovely old 2 bedroom house in Koudekerk aan den Rijn, a small village where nothing ever happens. It's on the Rijn itself. Her husband and her bought it for about the equivalent of 140,000 euros 20 years ago and it's worth 650,000 now.
                                      The Netherlands is a debt colony. The banks and the political class figured out that the Dutch are very good at looking after their finances, so they constructed a housing market that squeezed every last penny out of the population. The people put up with it, eat cheese sandwiches for lunch and go on caravan holidays.

                                      Dutch people I know are great at getting the best deals, but think nothing of spending over half their net income on housing costs for 30 years. It really is bizarre.

                                      Comment


                                        #20
                                        Living in the Netherlands

                                        Big Boobs and FIRE! wrote:
                                        5. Being able to go bashing in the 80s without the Head bag and Campri jacket that the UK scene was making cumpulsory.
                                        What does this mean, please?

                                        Comment

                                        Working...
                                        X