Work, income & wealth
Part II — life in the Netherlands
What it shows
Whether people have work, whether the typical household is materially better off, and whether growth is shared. Employment rate near EU top; real median income up roughly 44% between 1977 and 2019; poverty peaked around 22.5% in 1985 and fell hard through the 1990s; income Gini stable and below EU average.
What it cannot prove
Welfare net of housing and care costs; wealth inequality claims are structurally distorted because Dutch wealth statistics exclude pension assets (~200% of GDP) — a mandatory caveat. Employment rate counts heads, not hours — NL has the highest part-time share in the OECD, so pair with hours worked.
More indicators for this domain are planned — see the methodology & roadmap. Missing here means not credible yet, not forgotten.