Dear Chairman and Members of the SZW and KR Committees of the First and Second Chambers of the Dutch Parliament,
“Never waste a good crisis” is a saying attributed to Winston Churchill where he was referring to the founding of the United Nations which would never have happened without World War II.
In the domain of SZW and KR, I would like to assign the current benefits affair the role of “crisis” from which lessons could then be drawn for a less error- and fraud-prone future. I am thinking of the following.
Abolish (all) allowances and supplements, including those on reaching retirement age, and at the same time introduce basic income for all Dutch citizens whereby the basic income for minors will depend on their age.
So instead of all “rolls special” with variables like “age” and “how many children,” just one guaranteed and condition-free basic income.
And if we are going to simplify and standardize, then implement this measure immediately for the Caribbean Netherlands (i.e. Bonaire, St. Eustatius and Saba) and not just for the European Netherlands.
The advantage is obvious: no more fraud-sensitive information that could lead to wrongly or incompletely granted allowances or benefits and furthermore a huge control apparatus will be released because this guaranteed basic income simply applies to all Dutch citizens.
The question of whether working more also yields more – after all, I recently read in a newspaper that this self-evidence is somewhat undermined by the allowances – becomes clearly visible again. If one chooses to work (extra) for income, over and above the guaranteed basic income, one will always have more left over “below the line”. And that is fair and explainable.
Some calculations will undoubtedly have to be made, but I am convinced that a business case for the introduction of this policy will always be positive. A possible additional positive consequence could be that people would like to work more, which could eliminate a labor shortage.
I would like to see this proposal on the agenda of your meeting and then it is up to you to put the government on this revolutionary path.
Kind regards,
J.H.T. (Jan) Meijer
