Tax, healthcare, immigration: why Dutch people voted for Geert Wilders

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/23/dutch-explain-why-they-voted-for-geert-wilders-netherlands-election

by PaulHoule • 3 years ago

44 95 3 years ago

theguardian.com

gbrindisi• 3 years ago

how bad of a housing crisis is in the netherlands?

Wherever I look in europe there is a housing crisis for a reason or another.

dash2• 3 years ago

Very bad. In Amsterdam demand is crazy. People are being scammed on Facebook groups desperately hunting for a place to stay. Interestingly, a lot of adverts for flat sharers say "no internationals" - make of that what you will. I was there this summer and was offered a 1 room bedsit for 3000 Eur/month.

nottorp2• 3 years ago

The one dutch guy I know that bought a house bought it in ... Belgium.

Rents are horrendous. House prices the same.

The problem is kicking out those dirty foreigners who sweep your streets and raise rent prices won't lower rents. At best they will plateau for a little while.

mettamage• 3 years ago

Yea this seems to happen more and more.

The east and south of NL are more doable IMO. But I rather work remote and live somewhere else. I’m not a fan of how NL is developing.

fzeroracer4• 3 years ago

They aren't even kicking out all of the foreigners. He specifically wants to kick out all 'non-western' foreigners which is already a fraction of a fraction of the people who immigrate to the Netherlands. It's just red meat to racists who want to divert the problem away from things that are harder to solve to something that's easier and gets you voted in.

I imagine things will go down the same way as it did in the UK.

jsiepkes• 3 years ago

Pretty bad. It's a combination of legislation issues with nitrogen [1] and having shot the construction workforce in the foot in the previous financial crisis (large out flow of workers).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrogen_crisis_in_the_Netherl...

FooBarWidget5• 3 years ago

Very bad. Houses have doubled in price in just a few years. Many first-time home buyers cannot afford a house at all, and some say they never will as things look right now.

The government introduced various policies to remedy this, but all has failed. A few years ago they made it easier to fund young people, e.g. by allowing parents to gift 100k EUR to their children in a tax-free manner as long as it's used for buying a house. This resulted in higher housing prices because more people can afford higher prices, and it also disproportionally benefits people who have rich parents.

Now they've backpedalled on that, and the focus is now on disincentivizing investors. They raised ownership transfer taxes for people who buy a house for the purpose of renting it out. They also raised rent taxes. This works a bit better, but not enough. The core problem is just not enough housing. Also, renting out has become less profitable, so some landlords are selling those houses. This has raised concerns that we'll have too few rental housing.

It's not even just a matter of not building quickly enough. The electricity grid is full (not enough capacity), so there are more and more places where new houses can't even be attached to the grid.

meeuwer2• 3 years ago

My impression is that the government tried to 'solve' the problem with one main constraint in mind: to never allow the prices go down in any meaningful way. Hence the ham-fisted attempts to instead tweak taxes and ease credit conditions.

maeil• 3 years ago

The worst in Europe, and since much longer than any other country in Europe.

It's common for Dutch universities to only accept international students on the condition that they (i.e. the student) manage to find housing themselves, because there have been many cases where they enrolled but just couldn't get housing anywhere. You don't see that in other countries.

And it's been this bad for more than a decade.

cjrp4• 3 years ago

Can universities not build their own dorms / halls of residence?

CalRobert8• 3 years ago

Pretty bad. We had to accept an 18 month (instead of 12 month) contract and overbid by 200 euro a month for a 4 bed house in Hilversum. Also pre-paid a year, but I think that was more to do with me being self employed.

Though it still felt downright easy compared to Ireland, where we came from.

underseacables4• 3 years ago

When you look at the electorate of the PVV in general, it consists of people who experience more difficulties to get by. They are more lonely...

Sounds rather condescending. I don't like it when armchair experts place such subjective labels on people. "Lonely, less intelligent," etc. It's second guessing a persons vote which is a tacit way of undermining that vote.

Rather they should analyze policy and try to understand why those policies did not have a positive impact on the lives of voters who opposed them, not assume it is because they have some negative attribute.

FooBarWidget5• 3 years ago

I don't see it as condescending, I see it as just factual descriptions. Of course, assuming that their research is sound.

They should understand the voters' profiles as well as analyze why previous policies did not yield positive results. The two are not mutually exclusive, and are very probably interrelated.

rutierut• 3 years ago

I appreciate the sentiment but the idea that people support policy that’s good for them isn’t much better either.

For an obvious example check how many people support the Affordable Care Act vs Obamacare.

lotsofpulp• 3 years ago

For an obvious example check how many people support the Affordable Care Act vs Obamacare.

100%, since they are the same thing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affordable_Care_Act

Also, the ACA has undoubtedly resulted in more people getting more healthcare than in pre-ACA. The provisions to require covering people with pre existing health conditions and eliminating out of pocket maximums are a massive improvement over the pre-ACA days.

underseacables4• 3 years ago

affordable care act vs Obamacare

Those are the same thing…

tgv• 3 years ago

Sounds rather condescending.

It is, and it isn't really true either.

* 17 procent aged 18-34 voted PVV against 7 procent in the previous elections.

* 10 procent of people with a higher education voted PVV.

* PVV won country-side, but also in coties.

* M/F ratio is 53-47.

Source: NRC, 25-11-2023

Also: "difficulties to get by" should have been left-wing parties' priorities, but just one of them has been campaigning on that consistently (although they lost again in these elections).

a tacit way of undermining that vote.

It has "deplorables" written all over it. While I don't pretend to have the answers, The Guardian is trying to solve the problem by sticking fingers in their ears and shouting "na na na na na, I can't hear you".

trabant00• 3 years ago

While I worry about the recent success populism is having in Europe I too take issue with the way the politicians and their voters get presented in media. "Far right" is overused, worries about massive uncontrolled immigration played down and attributed to racism, etc. People don't just start voting populists out of thin air. They face some real issues. Ignoring those and resorting to labels will only push them further into populism and maybe some real extremist politics since there's nobody else addressing their concerns.

blululu• 3 years ago

In general the trope of a smug liberal is a thing, but I think you made the jump to intelligence:

>Matthijs Rooduijn, associate professor of political science at Amsterdam University, says such views are common among Wilders voters. “When you look at the electorate of the PVV in general, it consists of people who experience more difficulties to get by. They are more lonely. They feel that they are being neglected. They have tough lives basically, economically but also culturally,” he said.

Of course this trope doesn’t come from nowhere, but this is a professor of political science, who said nothing disrespectful about the intelligence of the group. I am inclined to think that the observation is based on some research findings and has some relevance.

underseacables4• 3 years ago

There was a post yesterday, or maybe the day before, here on HN about a BBC study that talked about intelligence related to a vote for Brexit. They claimed that people of low intelligence voted for Brexit.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38413594

lynx23• 3 years ago

Stupidity is the new elitist insult. It started to be really noticeable with COVID-19. People with different opinions were simply labeled as too stupid to understand the gravity of the situation. Same is happeneing with democracy. Voting for the other side? Must be dumb as fuck... People seem to have lost the ability to accept that there can be different opinions.

AnimalMuppet• 3 years ago

And, if not stupid, they must be doing it deliberately, so they're evil.

stef25• 3 years ago

A basket of deplorables

Funny coming from The Guardian, the working man's newspaper.

cjrp4• 3 years ago

Like Jeanette, she was drawn to Wilders for what he has said about housing and a promise of free transport for elderly people

Interesting, I assumed the Netherlands would already have free travel for the elderly. Most (all?) councils in the UK provide this, at least on buses.

FooBarWidget5• 3 years ago

It differs on a per-municipality basis. There's no national system.

cjrp4• 3 years ago

Ah I see. Here I think it's funded by your council, but can be used nationwide.

misja1112• 3 years ago

Weird to read a post here from a foreign newspaper trying to describe what happened in my own country. But largely it's true, many people are unhappy with the amount of migration, the housing crisis, the rising cost of living and also what they feel is too much environmentalism. They feel that the parties that were in the government during the last 10 years did not take their concerns seriously or even made them worse.

Whether the PVV can turn things in their favor is questionable, it's easy to shout things from the sideline but many of the current problems are still there because they are inherently difficult to solve. For instance, PVV proposes to stop all immigration. Apart from the economic problems that this might cause, it is simply not possible due to EU legislation. For which he has a solution as well; NL should step out of the EU. Being primarily an export country, the consequences would be disastrous for the Netherlands.

The housing crisis is another example of an ongoing problem. A major cause is the fact that NL is a very crowded country, it's just very difficult to find any fee space to build on. What makes this even more difficult is certain environmental regulation that forbids any project that increases nitrogen deposition. Again this regulation comes from the EU so NL can't just change it.

newyankee• 3 years ago

Canada is not at all a crowded country, yet it has housing crisis. At least Netherlands had the foresight to create dense, urban spaces with cycling infrastructure and half decent public transit. All they need to do now is replicate this. The thing about environmental concerns is that the nos should be balanced with human quality of life, and in that lens the Dutch way really works better than many other developed countries.

fzeroracer4• 3 years ago

As is with Canada, the problem is always investors. Canada's housing crisis stemmed from a lot of outside money buying up property simply to sit on it and leave it empty/unused, and in the Netherlands you see similar trends along with investors buying up property the moment it appears. Additionally, any bans on things like Airbnb gets overruled by the court system.

These are all things that lower taxes and kicking out foreigners can't solve, because that just opens up more property for investors to swoop in and buy. You stop investors from speculating on property and make it illegal for property to go unused and you solve a good chunk of the issue right there.

doublespanner2• 3 years ago

The way a country gets crowded has less to do with the actual land, and more to do with the rate of growth and investment in infrastructure.

The Netherlands had a similar population to Canada in 1950, but today's population is dramatically smaller. Combine that with a historical higher tax rate and investment in infrastructure, this is not something that can be replicated...

PaulHoule2• 3 years ago

British Colombia has the same problem as California in that it is a lot of land but most of it is uninhabitable.

red-iron-pine• 3 years ago

Canada and Australia are both facing a housing crisis, and that's mostly due to the fact that the country is huge, but the actually livable parts of the country are fairly small. Then add in the standard Anglo Neoliberalism and surprise surprise big money controls what little habitable space is available.

I've lived in both and worked outside in -40C and +40C, and both are rough. I'd rather be in Virginia and 4 actual seasons. Or San Diego, where there is just one.

ChatGTP• 3 years ago

PVV proposes to stop all immigration

Is there a documented case in history where this has been beneficial ? Not attacking you btw, I'm actually wondering if anyone has known this to be effective?

Immigrants seem like a token thing to get angry about when the chips are down and the country is mismanaged.

selfmodruntime2• 3 years ago

Poland.

Immigrants seem like a token thing to get angry about when the chips are down and the country is mismanaged.

This has been the primary opinion of center to leftleaning parties for a decade now. There are very real problems with immigration, even more so if a large part of immigration consists of migrations of cultures that are incompatible with western ideas.

throwaway6734• 3 years ago

Refugees from Africa and the middle east have struggled to assimilate, require more state resources, and generally commit crimes at a higher rate than natives and immigrants from other areas.

pelasaco6• 3 years ago

Facts and Accuracy matters.

PVV proposes to stop all immigration

The PVV proposes a "freeze on asylum" and "a generally more restrictive immigration policy".

broken-kebab• 3 years ago

This question is too broad to receive any satisfying answer. What's beneficial for a freemarket supporter is probably hurtful for a communist, with a lots of nuances in between. Also arguably the phenomenon is new in its current conditions, so historical precedents wouldn't be persuasive. However, the fact is that big influx of culturally different people usually upsets societies (and it is as much true for, say, India, or Kenya as for Netherlands), and it is reflected in political opinions shift. It's objective reality we can observe, and rhetorically discarding it (as a 'token thing') won't make it disappear.

doublespanner2• 3 years ago

Its a problem of metrics, if you look at the conditions of the middle third of the population, then historically less migration is better as a rule. If you look at GDP then it's more muddy.

As an example the Australian immigration restriction act created some of the best conditions for workers, due to a high value of labour leading to high wages, increased negotiation power, and investment in labour saving innovation.

It was good for the nation and individual workers, but to use terminology familiar here, a single generation decided to enshitify the country and cash in, extracting all the present and future value of existing institutions.

Part of this is a massive propaganda campaign to try and convince you that every measure to restrict migration is racist or misguided... However migration is the most important and significant policy for a long term outcomes in a nation, we have millenia of history to show this.

somenameforme• 3 years ago

It's difficult to look to historic precedent because the heart of all of these issues is fertility. This [1] is a graph of fertility rates in the US. Fertility rates just started plummeting catastrophically in the 60s. The exact same thing happened in the Netherlands. [2]

And that's what's causing the crisis. Fertility rates define not only the population in a region, but also the age distribution. Low fertility rates result in a population that will have many times more elderly people than youthful people, and will start shrinking far more rapidly than most realize. It will lead to both economic and social catastrophe. Trying to use mass immigration as a means of solving this problem is an inherently modern idea, because the problem did not exist in the past.

And IMO this isn't just an issue of management of a nation. Trying to create a stable economy and healthy society with a collapsing fertility rate may well just not be possible. On top of cultural conflicts there's also the fact you'll have to tax the death out of the youth in order to subsidize the elderly, at the same time those youth will find ever shrinking economic opportunities as your economy itself also naturally shrinks.

[1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/SPDYNTFRTINUSA

[2] https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/NLD/netherlands/fertil...

selfmodruntime2• 3 years ago

part from the economic problems that this might cause, it is simply not possible due to EU legislation

This is definitely untrue as countries like Poland show well enough. You do not need to stick to every EU rule, you just need to be well off enough to pay off your fines.

longdudefromnl• 3 years ago

Quote: Again this regulation comes from the EU so NL can't just change it

This is -I think- (one of) the main reasons people voted PVV. We (the Dutch people) can't even make their own decisions! And when things fall apart (and they are: housing, inflation, too much environmentalism, declining healthcare, etc) this is exactly what we need: make decisions to fix this. But we 'can't' because of EU. This is extremely angering and fueled the rise of PVV. And don't get me wrong: I'm one of them. And no, I'm not 'far right'. I just want to fix things. If you can't take care of yourself, you can't help others.

fzeroracer4• 3 years ago

I would hope people would look at Brexit as a model of how well that line of thought works. Especially as we're seeing how ugly the downstream effects are years afterwards.

soco• 3 years ago

The main reason is that people don't feel like being responsible for their own solutions, just expect it from a savior - failing EU then a local one. They keep blaming whoever else while forgetting THEY are part of the EU and THEY vote for every single point on the EU action list and legislation, yes including environmentalism. And continuing to not feel responsible, they vote for the guy who takes them out of that EU responsibilities, while promising he will deliver locally on exactly the same points he failed previously to deliver on the EU level. And the voters believed him, of course, ignoring there are green and left-wing parties on local level just as well. Well, this eternal naivety some iron hand will save us, same since the dawn of history...

huijzer• 3 years ago

I find it a large leap to go from "broken housing, inflation, too much environmentalism, and declining healthcare" to "the EU is the problem". All these "problems", as far as they exist, exist in the whole EU as well as in the US. The cause is therefore unlikely to be the EU.

A more likely cause of some problems is the lack of people in the working age, that is, a demographic problem. The US has solved (historically) and is solving this via immigration, which is exactly the thing that Wilders wants to stop. Put differently, who is gonna build the houses? Many Dutch youths have completed a bachelor or master degree, so are not interested in that line of work.

pelasaco6• 3 years ago

Again this regulation comes from the EU so NL can't just change it

I agree with you, even worse is when some mayor candidate comes with that and we all know that in the city level, youhave almost no change to influence such decisions.

However EU, has nothing set in stone and it is democratic. NL don't have to leave EU, but join the (increasing) block doing lobby to change those rules.

nprateem• 3 years ago

Liberals in general branded anyone with any concerns about immigration as racist. This let the right-wingers control the debate and play on peoples' fears. The results were Brexit, Trump and now this guy.

akudha• 3 years ago

We see this in many democracies. On one side, we have a feel good but do-nothing-useful group of politicians. On the other side, we have hate spewing politicians. At some point, people get tired of voting for do-nothing crowd and vote for the shitty crowd, it usually makes things worse.

There is a burning building. One group just stands there taking pictures. Another group tosses gasoline into the fire. These are the two choices voters have…

petre2• 3 years ago

Apart from the economic problems that this might cause, it is simply not possible due to EU legislation.

It is possible. Don't give them money and only provide basic shelter. Do you wonder why the migrants don't stay in Eastern Europe? Because here we offer accomodation in tents. There isn't enough social housing for citizens (largely Roma), let alone migrants.

We have friends and neighbours from Germany who want retire early and to move back to Eastern Europe because they are unhappy with the federal government taxing them nearly ~500€ in order to house and feed migrants. These neighbours are working class people of retirement age, who left to Germany during the communist regime, leaving everything behind. There they were housed in a Lager common social housing with shared toilets and showers and they had to work to support themselves. Now they see how migrants are treated and view them as freeloaders. The fact that they're muslim and also cause problems doesn't help either.

So I'm not at all surprised the Dutch voted with Wilders.

66fm472tjy7• 3 years ago

It is possible. Don't give them money and only provide basic shelter

In the EU you would have to reduce your welfare state to that level for your own citizens as well. The ECJ says[0]:

It follows that the level of social security benefits paid to refugees by the Member State which granted that status, whether temporary or permanent, must be the same as that offered to nationals of that Member State

[0] https://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&do...

PaulHoule2• 3 years ago

I think Wilders is pretty well known in the anglosphere, or at least I've been following him for a very long time. (Long before I got a job related to political science where I can listen to the 538 podcast and claim it is work related.) On the other hand, I've been a fan of the Netherlands too.

CalRobert8• 3 years ago

I'm a recent immigrant to NL but one kind of surprising thing is how low density a lot of the cities are. Look around Hilversum, Houten, etc. (random examples I'm familiar with) and it's mostly rowhouses. It seems like there should be an opportunity to replace a lot of these with something like the 4-5 story buildings you see in Paris, for instance.

Also, quite a few cars (and big SUV's, and even quite a few full-size American pickup trucks, bafflingly). Biking to school with my kids is frustrating and sometimes feels dangerous. Though maybe that's just Hilversum. They seem really eager to rely on supposed woonerfs instead of actually providing separated infrastructure.

I feel like "I generally favour immigration but understand that having a substantial influx of a population that does not integrate well, regardless of their background" is a hard stance to take. I don't really align with any party so far as I can tell (not that it matters, I can't vote). I'm originally American and if there were large groups of people moving here from Texas, not learning Dutch, and bringing Texan values I'd be pretty worried.

misja1112• 3 years ago

In Hilversum you will see a lot more big SUV's than in a typical Dutch city, the area ('Gooi') is considered quite posh in the Netherlands.

Yes there definitely are possibilities to make more out the existing urban area's. But wherever someone has an idea for building more houses, there always are others that are against it. In your case, building 4-5 story buildings would be seen by some as disturbing the skyline of the city. They'd rather keep their current small city atmosphere.

pelasaco6• 3 years ago

I'm originally American and if there were large groups of people moving here from Texas, not learning Dutch, and bringing Texan values I'd be pretty worried.

Sure just replace the rowhouses with skyscrapers and burn the cars.. looking the results of the last elections sounds like your Californian and not Texan values are what worries the Dutch people.. unbelievable

theodric3• 3 years ago

Hilversum

Wealthy. That probably explains some of it.

28304283409234• 3 years ago

I love the framing 'environmentalism'. Nature is dying and we're stuck on blaming the messenger. I wheep for our children.

wappieslurkz• 3 years ago

Frankly I'm afraid most people voting for those fascist parties (and other right wing parties) had no clue what they were actually voting for. Populism works really well, sadly.

I think it's time for a populist progressive left wing party in The Netherlands as a counterweight to the havoc the parties on the right are causing.

pelasaco6• 3 years ago

I'm not from the Netherlands, but Geert Wilders' biography on Wikipedia suggests he has a more diverse background and life story compared to many German politicians, which is intriguing and seems at odds with media portrayals.

However, I'm curious about his educational background. His credentials from the Open Universiteit, listed as 'Rechtsgeleerdheid (deelcertificaten),' appear to be partial certifications rather than a full degree. if it is true, as it looks, it reflects a broader trend in Europe of politicians having limited formal education, a sad and recurring phenomenon regardless of their political stance"...

ghusto• 3 years ago

This term "Islamophobia", I do not think it means what you think it means.

This name-calling and marginalising is damaging. It causes people who may have been open to reasonable solutions to _the real issues of immigration and non-integration of minorities_ to shut their ears and edge closer to extremes.

moribvndvs• 3 years ago

Difficult times are fertile ground for the cult of personality.

theodric3• 3 years ago

37 seats out of 150 is a hair under 25%: a largish plurality by Dutch many-party standards, but hardly an overwhelming mandate. Anything Wilders wants to do has to be accomplished by consensus with other parties who want to work with him. We'll see if that even happens. What this should be, however, is a wake-up call to the other parties that they cannot take support for granted.

nojvek• 3 years ago

There is a very good chance Trump would be elected again.

For the median worker, healthcare, housing + utilities and food costs have shot up.

The cost of sustaining yourself has gone up but wages haven’t.

Yet we bring in more people to the country. I’m okay with controlled high skilled immigration but totally not okay with illegal immigration.

We should really working on policies that lead to good gradient of fixed resource ownership (land and housing, healthcare).

Tax, healthcare, immigration: why Dutch people voted for Geert Wilders

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