A Skewed Public Debate
In a recent investigation by De Volkskrant, titled The highly skilled migrant feels less welcome and fears tightening of rules, foreign professionals share their concerns about the changing political climate. They feel increasingly less welcome in a country they consciously chose. In public opinion, the expat is nowadays blamed for almost every societal bottleneck, from the overheated housing market to overcrowded trains and pressure on public services.
That picture does not match the facts.
Knowledge migrants do not take jobs. They fill specialized positions that simply cannot be filled locally. The arrival of an international specialist acts as a flywheel for the entire chain: for every specialized researcher or engineer, several new jobs arise in practice for local suppliers, technicians, and support services. International labor mobility does not cost the Netherlands prosperity, but rather brings in new economic activity.
Foreign Talent Is No Luxury
The idea that Dutch employers just fly in foreign workers is based on a misunderstanding. An organization naturally looks first locally or within the European Union.
Hiring a knowledge migrant, after all, requires a serious commitment. Employers must have recognized sponsorship with the IND, meet statutory salary criteria, and ensure ongoing compliance obligations, such as the duty to inform and administrative duties. It is a well-thought-out trajectory that companies consciously deploy because the required specialized knowledge simply lacks in their own country.
Not a single country in the world is self-sufficient in high-grade technical and scientific personnel. Take Brainport Eindhoven. Chip machine builders, photonics developers, and precision manufacturers compete globally at the very highest level. When a company like ASML develops lithography software, mathematicians and physicists are needed who are scarce on a global scale. Whoever does not bring those people to the Netherlands sees projects slow down or sees innovation move abroad.
Serving Global Markets from Dutch Soil
The Netherlands owes its prosperity to exports and international trade. Dutch companies develop products and services for customers in North America, Asia, and Latin America.
To serve those markets successfully, you need people who understand the language, business customs, and legal frameworks of those regions. That knowledge should not only sit at a foreign sales office, but precisely at the table with the decision-makers at the Dutch headquarters.
With a purely local team, you lose connection with foreign buyers. International employees bring specific market knowledge that directly contributes to the revenue of Dutch enterprises.
Figures versus Gut Feeling
Current political sentiment leans heavily on gut feelings. Hard numbers show a very different picture.
In economic science, the effect of highly educated knowledge migrants on local labor markets has been extensively researched. The assumption that foreign workers would displace jobs of the local population is consistently refuted by empirical research. A specialist who starts at a technology company does not snatch work away, but acts as a booster: rather, new jobs arise in the chain around that specialist. In Europe and the Netherlands, we see around Brainport Eindhoven and campuses in Delft and Leiden exactly the same dynamic as in international innovation hubs.
What the economic data proves:
Wennink Report – Strengthening the Earning Capacity of the Netherlands:
warns that future Dutch prosperity depends on high-tech leadership, with access to international talent as an absolute prerequisite.
Core summary: Future economic growth will have to come almost entirely from higher labor productivity, yet Dutch productivity growth has slowed for decades. We need a structural breakthrough to reverse this trend. The scarcity of qualified technical talent is a critical bottleneck. Sustaining our earning capacity requires clear choices in high-tech niches where the Netherlands leads, backed by solid fundamentals in research and talent development.
Dutch Government & CPB – IBO Labor Migration (What Works for the Future):
shows that highly educated knowledge migrants deliver a strong net surplus to public finances and innovation. They generate an average net lifetime benefit of roughly 150,000 euros per migrant to the state treasury (see Summary p. 7 and Section 4.3 on Public Finances p. 73).
Core summary (p. 7 & p. 73): The economic benefits of labor migration in the Netherlands are positive, but vary by category. Highly educated and highly paid migrants have a consistently positive impact on productivity growth and public finances. Knowledge migrants and foreign students contribute substantially more to the treasury and productivity than low-wage labor migrants. Over their life cycle, they yield an average positive net contribution of approximately 150,000 euros per migrant.
Giovanni Peri et al. – STEM Workers and Productivity (NBER):
evaluates foreign engineering and tech talent. It shows zero displacement of native workers. By plugging critical skill shortages, foreign professionals boost overall firm productivity and raise native wages across the board.
Abstract: Scientists, Technology professionals, Engineers, and Mathematicians (STEM workers) are fundamental inputs in scientific innovation and technological adoption, the main drivers of productivity growth in the U.S. In order to identify a supply-driven and heterogeneous increase in STEM workers across U.S. cities, we use the distribution of foreign-born STEM workers in 1980 and exploit the variation of the H-1B visa program. We find that H-1B-driven increases in STEM workers in a city were associated with significant increases in wages paid to college educated natives. Wage increases for non-college educated natives are smaller but still significant. We do not find significant effects on employment. Together, these results imply a significant effect of foreign STEM on total factor productivity growth in the average US city between 1990 and 2010.
Enrico Moretti – Local Multipliers (NBER & AER):
documents the spatial employment multiplier. Adding one skilled tradable job creates 2.5 to 5 supplementary jobs in the local service economy, from technical maintenance and logistics to local retail and construction.
Abstract: Every time a local economy generates a new job by attracting a new business, additional jobs might also be created, mainly through increased demand for local goods and services. Adding one additional skilled job in the tradable sector generates 2.5 jobs in local goods and services. The corresponding figure for unskilled jobs is one. Industry-specific multipliers indicate that high tech industries have the largest multiplier.
Room for Students and New Talent
In Dutch secondary schools, we stimulate bilingual education, so that young people manage effortlessly in an international environment. We consider it normal that Dutch people speak languages and look across the border.
It is contradictory to close the doors at the same time to foreign students at our universities and universities of applied sciences. Foreign students bring new perspective and fill shortages in technical and medical fields of study.
Through schemes such as the orientation year (zoekjaar), graduated talents can start work immediately at Dutch companies at a reduced salary criterion. That yields the Dutch economy ready-trained specialists who already partly command the language and are embedded in society. Whoever rejects that group throws away a massive investment.
Political rhetoric and changing legislation cause uncertainty for employers and international employees. The rules around the 30% ruling and residence permits are becoming stricter, and administrative burdens are increasing.
Yet the real economy does not stop. Companies must move forward and talent wants to push boundaries.
At Executive Mobility Group (EMG), we do not wait for policy changes. We are on top of changing legislation around the IND, the 30% ruling, and tax shifts such as in Box 3. Precisely now that partial foreign tax liability is expiring and expats face wealth tax on their worldwide assets, clear personal guidance is indispensable.
We calculate the consequences for the net salary in advance, apply bilateral tax treaties to prevent double taxation on foreign savings or real estate, and support tax returns based on the actual return. At the same time, we advise employers on tightened salary criteria and alternative permit routes before new rules take effect. In this way, we remove tax and administrative unrest for both the organization and the specialist. Companies can continue to recruit with confidence, and talent can get to work immediately and without hurdles.
The Netherlands urgently needs top talent from outside to keep playing internationally. Let us conduct the debate based on facts, and continue building an open economy that can compete on a global scale.