SDG 10.2 Financial sustainability

The second part of SDG 10 is about reducing inequality. In the Netherlands, people incur debts and build up capital individually as well as collectively, which has an impact on the well-being of future generations. The greatest challenges facing the Netherlands are population ageing, economic crises, globalisation, and declining solidarity between generations and population groups.

• Demographic changes are a challenge to the long-term sustainability of public services.
• Households have a high level of debt relative to other EU countries, and it is increasing.
• Pension capital accrued by households has been on a downward trend in recent years, while the number of people who are entitled to a pension relative to the number of people paying in pension contributions is stable and the coverage ratio is rising.

Dashboard and indicators

Colour codes and notes to the dashboards in the Monitor of Well-being

Resources and opportunities concern the sustainable financing of the welfare state and the accumulation of pensions and wealth without burdening future generations. One effect of the ageing population is to alter the ratio between the number of employed people and non-employed people. This is putting pressure on the affordability of public services paid for from tax revenues, such as healthcare, education, the state pension, defence and infrastructure. This demographic shift is reflected in increased grey pressure (the ratio of people aged 65 and over to the 20-64 age group) and decreased green pressure (the ratio of people under 20 to the 20-64 age group). The CBS Population forecast for 2025-2070 projects that the Dutch population will continue to grow and that the average age will increase.

In recent years, the average pension capital of households (excluding the state pension) has been trending downwards, despite an increase in 2024 to 178,700 euros. Pension assets accrued through pension funds cannot be accessed freely and are not transferable, but they do contribute to household financial security over the long term. CBS uses factors such as life expectancy and the expected return on pension contributions to estimate the size of pension capital.

Dutch employees generally save for their pensions through their employers, who invest their pension contributions in a pension fund. The ratio of assets (pension capital) to liabilities (pension entitlements of all participants) gives an indication of a pension fund’s ability to pay out current and future pensions. This coverage ratio is trending upwards and stood at 129.1 percent at the end of 2025.

Use concerns the withdrawal of resources from the capital accrued. The number of people receiving pension payments from the pension fund (beneficiaries) relative to the number of people paying premiums is stable. The number of people receiving pensions is increasing but the number of people paying premiums is also increasing. In 2024, this was primarily the result of a change in the law which enabled individuals to start accruing pension rights from the age of 18 instead of 21. For every 100 employees who accrued pension rights in 2024, 59.4 people were receiving payments from a pension fund. A reduction can be seen in the number of workers without pensions. Self-employed people are responsible for their own pension provision. Some of them have little or no pension savings, and this proportion rose in 2023.

Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, calculates the ratio between the pension income of 65 to 75-year-olds and the income from work of 50 to 60-year-olds (pension entitlements). In 2025, this ratio was 56 percent in the Netherlands. This provides a picture of the change in income that people experience as they start to draw their pension. The closer this ratio is to 100, the fewer people will face a reduction in income when they retire.

Outcomes concern debt and the sustainability of financial systems. While public debt has been trending downwards, in 2024 it rose by 0.6 percentage points to 44.4 percent of GDP. The gross debt ratio is currently at its third-lowest level since measurements began in 1995, and is well below the formal European limit of 60 percent of GDP. Although public debt has increased in absolute terms since 2019, GDP has grown at a faster rate.

Household debt has been increasing for some time, and was up by 3.1 percent in 2024 to an average of 124 thousand euros. Compared to other EU countries, only Luxembourg had a higher average household debt. Household savings, however, are also trending upwards, increasing by 7 percent in 2025. These figures on debt and savings have been taken from the national accounts, allowing international comparisons to be made.

Households with mortgages had an average of 209 thousand euros of mortgage debt at the start of 2024. The data on mortgage debts is taken from CBS’s Integral Income and Assets Survey. Data on mortgage debts is difficult to compare with data from other countries due to differences in definitions. The value of mortgage debt is increasing. This concerns the outstanding debt: amounts accrued for mortgage repayment in the form of endowment policies, investment and savings mortgages and the like have been deducted from the figure.

Homes have risen sharply in value in recent years, while mortgage lenders are increasingly selective in their assessment of applicants’ financial situation. This has made it harder for first-time buyers SDG 11.1 to buy a home. This group is financially vulnerable because they tend to borrow more as a proportion fo the total value of their home. Among homeowners under the age of 35, however, the ratio of mortgage debt to home value is trending downwards. From 2011, when measurements began, until 2016, this ratio was above 1 on average: over half of homeowners had mortgage debt that exceeded the value of their home. After that, the ratio fell to its current level of 0.64 in 2024.

Subjective assessment relates to uncertainty about and confidence in the future. In 2025, the share of people who were seriously concerned about their financial futures increased again to 28.1 percent. This percentage had previously declined from the beginning of the measurement period in 2013 until 2021, after which it rose significantly in 2022 and 2023. Inflation was exceptionally high during those years. Following a dip in 2024, the percentage rose again in 2025.