00:00How much do immigrants cost the Netherlands?
00:07The Netherlands is about to head to the polls
00:09in a snap general election
00:11following the collapse of the Schof government.
00:13And immigration has been a hot topic of debate,
00:16particularly how much migrants cost the country's coffers.
00:19For example, Dutch far-right commentator Ewa Wladdingerbroek
00:23recently made the claim that every non-Western immigrant
00:26in the Netherlands costs the national treasury
00:28an average of €600,000.
00:31Her claims appeared to be an exaggeration of figures
00:33published in various studies over recent years,
00:36including one first published in 2021
00:38titled Borderless Welfare State by Jan van der Beek and others.
00:42The study estimated that the fiscal cost of migration
00:45to the Dutch treasury between 1995 and 2019
00:48stood at €400 billion,
00:51attracting widespread attention from the Dutch media and politicians.
00:55However, many critics have come out in opposition
00:57to the report as the election campaign went on.
01:00The Cube spoke to several Dutch economists
01:02who said that while the statistics on which it is based may be correct,
01:06they have been misinterpreted and don't reveal the true cost of immigrants.
01:10For example, they said that the van der Beek study miscalculates
01:13migration costs by treating all public goods,
01:16such as defence and flood protection,
01:18as if they increase as the population grows,
01:20as is the case with things such as police services.
01:23When adjusting for this, the economists said that the supposed €17.3 billion loss
01:28caused by migrants in 2016, for example,
01:31falls to about €8.4 billion, or less than 1% of GDP.
01:36Ultimately, while certain groups of migrants, such as asylum seekers,
01:40may cost the treasury more than they contribute,
01:42figures claiming to show how much migration costs as a whole
01:46are often misinterpreted and inflated.
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