Dutch King: Say Goodbye to Welfare State

Dutch King: Say Goodbye to Welfare State

Depends on what 'goodbye' means ?

King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands had a message for the citizens yesterday.

Due to circumstances and failing economic policies, it looks like we will soon become a "participation society".

Apparently the government there is cutting way back on many social welfare programs.

Some comments under the article are blaming the high Muslim population.

But welfare is welfare right ?

AMSTERDAM
King Willem-Alexander delivered a message to the Dutch people from the government Tuesday in a nationally televised address: the welfare state of the 20th century is gone.

In its place a "participation society" is emerging, in which people must take responsibility for their own future and create their own social and financial safety nets, with less help from the national government.

"The shift to a `participation society' is especially visible in social security and long-term care," the king said, reading out to lawmakers a speech written for him by Prime Minister Mark Rutte's government.

"The classic welfare state of the second half of the 20th century in these areas in particular brought forth arrangements that are unsustainable in their current form."


"The necessary reforms take time and demand perseverance," the king said. But they will "lay the basis for creating jobs and restoring confidence."

Dutch King: Say Goodbye to Welfare State


Interesting.

The story also points out that the King with receive a pay cut himself !!

from around 825,000 euros ($1.1 million) this year to 817,000 euros

Awwww !!


I wonder how much the King and family get every year from Royal Dutch Oil Co. (Shell) ?

Well in the you es back in the 1930's when there was the great depression, they set up work camps. So if you were starving you'd go to a work camp. The work camp laborers would get 3 meals per day, and a place to sleep. So you'd have your basic needs met. So then they'd go out and build all kinds of stuff. like bridges, farm labor, roads, irragation, and the list goes on and on. That's what they should do in Amsterdam rather than giving a hand out. Just offer them a small hand out, or if they want say double that and food/room, they could go to the work camp on a volentary basis. And they could leave say for example at any time if they weren't happy. Then they could use those people to go build stuff, like road projects, and all kinds of public works. And they could do it for cheap rather than having to pay civil engineers tons of money to do things.

Well without revenues coming in how long can those type of benefits last? When we boil it down social security in the US has been raided for how long by those in office? Relying on the gov't to provide heck, even oversee money if foolish. Of course people are not gonna like the Dutch Kings idea, I mean how will the people already dependent on their gov't be affected I wonder? This will bear watching.

reply to post by xuenchen


Makes sense.

You cant count on colonies giving tribute in a subservient role, you cant borrow on future money "someone else" will pay back anymore...so you have to live within your means.

I say good.

That bubble had to pop. It will do the citizenry good to stand on their own two feet. Some may fall through the cracks, but THAT IS LIFE. In the end, their society will be stronger and more enriched.

I wonder if taxes will reflect this cut as well. If there is less public spending then there should be less of a need for revenue to fund the now axed welfare programs.

It is not a travesty that nature is not fair. It is just its nature......hence why we have all been forced to change, adapt and EVOLVE in order to survive. That is a good thing.....we dont live in caves because we can and choose not to...we dont because we cant. SO we build complex cities and homes in complex societies to make survival possible. GOOD....change is a good thing usually and necessity is the mother of all innovation.

"fair" is a man made concept that deals with known variables for all parties involved. Life is not a variable you can just plug into an equation to figure out a desired outcome.

reply to post by xuenchen


If you read the whole story, you'll realize that some of the blame lies at the feet of the Dutch gov't austerity measures. Nevermind that maintaining the king in the style to which he is accustomed costs about $100 million a year. No plans to cut that, nor the country's purchase of high-priced military technology.

a "participation society" is emerging, in which people must take responsibility for their own future and create their own social and financial safety nets

Wow, it sounds like the Republicans' class warfare got appropriated by some royals who were looking for a good line of BS to bankrupt their people.

How in the $%^& can poor people "create their own safety nets"???

You can't take everything away from people in a modern society and have them survive. It's not like they all have farms and can start feeding themselves.
You will have people rioting and killing themselves like what happened in Greece so the rich can have some fun.

reply to post by xuenchen

from around 825,000 euros ($1.1 million) this year to 817,000 euros

He doesn't even make as much as our non-profit CEOs. That's not fair!

spartacus699
Well in the you es back in the 1930's when there was the great depression, they set up work camps. So if you were starving you'd go to a work camp. The work camp laborers would get 3 meals per day, and a place to sleep. So you'd have your basic needs met. So then they'd go out and build all kinds of stuff. like bridges, farm labor, roads, irragation, and the list goes on and on.

And how would that help companies which would otherwise build those bridges, roads, etc?

Farm labor? Sorry, but no. Manual labor can't compete with machines on a modern farm. Have you ever taken a look at modern farms? Yes, there are special situations (like plucking asparagus) where manual labor is needed, indeed - but that is not the day-to-day job on a farm. Can't employ people forever with these jobs.

IN other words: this idea is not working out anymore. We are not in a situation where a lot of manual work is done, nowadays. The workforce of untrained personal isn't needed anymore on any large scale.

Edit: Oh, and it might send more companies into bankruptcy because of that very cheap competition. Which would be illegal (at least in Germany).

Year in year out everyone here in Holland, who had: backaches, depressions, burnout (slight), all kind of small problems, autistic child, etcetcetc, could stay at home and and get enough money to have a life. Even get money to go on vacation.
Anyone could get money for children living abroad, without anybody checking if you really had 15 children abroad.

Year in year out anyone who wanted to do so could grow marijuana, earning more than he got from welfare (and still getting welfare) without anyone noticing that the big car or the 4 expensive vacations a year cannot be paid with welfare money.

There was almost no checking with doctors etc. Remember, we were so proud being a welfare state with confidence in peoples honesty. In peoples willingness to work.

And now we all have to pay for these shortsightedness.

Welfare is great and it must be possible for someone who really is not able to work, to live a normal life.
But for years Holland was looked upon as one big fairytale park, where everybody could having a good life without working.
And now old people who have worked hard all their lives and who made this welfare state happen, have to accept a cut in their hard earned money, Lets hope their children will help, but mostly these children will have to accept large cuts themselves.

We still live well here in Holland, compared to other places, but I hope we will have learned a lesson.

reply to post by ManFromEurope

Perhaps this is insensitive of me but, I don't think we are all that comfortable with either the idea or the source.

Perhaps a new aphorism is in order:

"don't trust Germans bearing solutions that involve work camps"

reply to post by spartacus699

Well in the you es back in the 1930's when there was the great depression, they set up work camps. So if you were starving you'd go to a work camp. The work camp laborers would get 3 meals per day, and a place to sleep. So you'd have your basic needs met.

Isn't that a glorified slave labour camp?

I thought we were aiming to progress towards a positive and caring society - all I see around me is evidence of us regressing to something akin to Victorian society along with all the social injustices and inequalities that went with it.

greencmp
reply to post by ManFromEurope

 

Perhaps this is insensitive of me but, I don't think we are all that comfortable with either the idea or the source.

Perhaps a new aphorism is in order:

"don't trust Germans bearing solutions that involve work camps"

Man, that was of course insensitive, but I laughed anyway!

But I don't think you got my gist: I wanted to show that labor camps are the worst - either for the affected people and of course for companies which would otherwise do those works (building roads, bridges, doing farmwork, etc).

reply to post by hangedman13

Of course people are not gonna like the Dutch Kings idea,.....

It's not the 'King's idea'; the Dutch King addresses the nation each year presenting the budget for the coming year in a speech written for him by the Prime Minister.

It's the much the same as here in the UK when once a year the Queen attends the Opening Of Parliament and reads out a speech prepared for her giving details of the Bills that the government intend to introduce to Parliament during that year.

I can understand how those who don't have Constitutional Monarchies like The Netherlands and the UK would be confused by such proceedings but the reality is that our relative monarchs have very, very little influence over the policies of our ruling governments.

ManFromEurope

greencmp
reply to post by ManFromEurope

 

Perhaps this is insensitive of me but, I don't think we are all that comfortable with either the idea or the source.

Perhaps a new aphorism is in order:

"don't trust Germans bearing solutions that involve work camps"

Man, that was of course insensitive, but I laughed anyway!

But I don't think you got my gist: I wanted to show that labor camps are the worst - either for the affected people and of course for companies which would otherwise do those works (building roads, bridges, doing farmwork, etc).

Ah, sorry, I misunderstood. You are correct, damaging to every aspect of society.

Happy to entertain though!

reply to post by Freeborn


I am not sure if this is true for the UK or the Netherlands .....but in Spain the king still has the power of veto over any legislation or decision made by any court in the land. He NEVER uses it publicly but is said to have exercised it privately several times.

reply to post by notsosunny


Yeah it did look like a fairy tale to everyone looking in. Those who knew better knew it couldn't last and that it would have SERIOUS repercussions on future generations.

You have to wonder if the population is even capable of surviving on its own anymore.

A huge disservice was done to them. How are they going to compete with other nations in the short term?

Especially those of Italy, Portugal, Spain, or Greece which are REALLY hungry for progress and have a more acute survival instinct ...?

For many years the Netherlands has fared well, but the EU and euro has ruined this country and every other memberstate in the eurozone.
This will not stop and will not get better because the root of the problem lies in the implemention of the euro and credit policies.
But also dutch policies have done much damage.
For years people were able to lend more than what was healthy in terms of financial housekeeping, which has led to a bubble in house prizes and overal consumerism.
This has been adressed which has effects, house prizes are imploding leaving many home buyers with a mortgage debt higher than their home is worth, people are in debt and don't spend anymore causing shops and other business to go bankrupt and that means people lose their job.
This is a spiral that strengthens itself, those people who lose their job will have a very hard time to be able to find a new job, but the bills keep coming.
In a normal situation a country can depreciate its currency to kickstart the economy by making labour and export cheaper while import is more expensive.
With the euro this is not possible anymore, but every memberstate has to pay billions to the EU so they can spend it elsewhere and of course the EU politicians need to be paid there high saleries and pension and so on, for them it is heaven.
But beside that every member state also has to pay billions in bailout money for debt laden member states which are cut of from the capital markets.
This can and will not last, inevitable the euro is going to break up with the northern members states as the biggest losers, Finland, Germany, Netherlands.

Before the crisis, the state debt of the Netherlands was 43 percent, it is now well over 70 percent and rising fast.
Because there is no possibility to depreciate the currency, the only option is to cut spending in a harsh way as the government is doing for the last 3 years.
This leads to high unemployment and poverty, less income revenue for the state, but more social benefits for the unemployed.
So again there arises a need to cut even more spending, a downward spiral.

Wait for it, after the German elections there will be firework, the eurozone simply cannot continue like this.

I've always felt the social welfare programs in europe were a bubble waiting to pop. There's just no way you can keep giving freebies to people without killing your budget. I also think people in that kind of society slowly forget how to be independent. That independent spirit of hard work and perseverance that provided them so many riches was put aside in favor of giveaways and we're now seeing the consequences of that.

I also think healthcare costs are a bubble. The costs of the procedures people are wanting is simply too high. Premiums are outpacing inflation. Expectations are too high. The result will be people not being able to afford healthcare and widespread outrage and then large cutbacks and eventually people will have to have lower expectations and I think this will cause people to exercise more and not depend on their doctor's so much.

All stated what it means is people need to be held accountable for their own actions. If you don't work, you don't eat. If you don't watch your diet and exercise and habits, you have ill health. It's common sense, but in our society these lessons are hard won.

reply to post by Freeborn


Thanks I did not know that being in the US! Oops my ignorance was showing However it is a time honored tradition to shoot the messenger so to speak. So by being the one to relay it the people will direct their anger at him.

reply to post by xuenchen


About time the plebs and unwashed masses got to work. How can any monarch live without earning 1 mil plus.

Might as well have said let them eat cake.

Bring on the guillotine!