Well-being ‘here and now’: labour and leisure time

Labour and leisure time concerns the quantity and quality of work and the balance between work and leisure time. Paid and unpaid work gives people control over their lives and helps them develop skills and a sense of value and usefulness to society. Leisure time contributes to health, life satisfaction and social relationships.

• An increasing share of people (aged 15 to 74) work.
• The trends in long-term unemployment and job insecurity are falling.
• Satisfaction with work and leisure time is high compared with other EU countries and the percentage of those in work who feel they do not have a good work-life balance is falling.
• The share of those in work who experience mental fatigue as a result of work is increasing.

Well-being 'here and now'

Labour and leisure time

0.5%

of the labour force had been unemployed for one year or more in 2024

1st

out of 27
in EU
in 2023

Long-term unemployment

73.2%

of population aged 15-74 in 2024

1st

out of 27
in EU
in 2023

Net labour participation

37.0%

of 15-74 year-olds have succesfully completed tertiary education in 2024

7th

out of 27
in EU
in 2023

Level of education achieved: HBO, WO

74.9%

of the population over 18 are satisfied or very satisfied in 2024

6th

out of 26
in EU
in 2022

Satisfaction with leisure time

3.46

vehicle hours lost per capita in 2023

Time lost due to traffic congestion and delays

78.7%

of employees aged 15-74 are satisfied or very satisfied in 2024

7th

out of 27
in EU
in 2017

Satisfaction with work (employees)

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

This part of the dashboard points to stable or rising well-being, with positions towards the top of the European rankings. Due to labour market shortages, there are plenty of opportunities to work. Nowhere else in the EU is labour participation as high as in the Netherlands. Of the population aged 15 to 74, 73.2 percent were in paid employment in 2024, and the trend is rising. Unemployment remained low, although it was slightly higher than in 2023. The share of the labour force affected by long-term unemployment (more than one year out of work) is also low, at 0.5 percent. These two labour market indicators are on a downward trend, and here, too, the Netherlands is doing relatively well compared with other EU countries.

The strong demand for workers is not reflected in the financial remuneration for work. Employees’ real hourly wages are among the highest in the EU, but they have not risen since 2009. In fact, real hourly wages were lower in 2023 than in 2009. The share of total earned income accounted for by remuneration from labour of employees and the self-employed is falling and the share of company profits is rising.

In addition to the availability of work, perceived work-life balance and satisfaction with various aspects of work are important components of well-being ‘here and now’. Three-quarters of the population were satisfied or very satisfied with the amount of free time they had in 2024. Job satisfaction is also high in the Netherlands: 78.7 percent of employees were satisfied or very satisfied in 2024. This is high compared with other EU countries. Despite this high degree of satisfaction, an increasing share of the working population are experiencing mental fatigue as a result of work. However, the proportion of people saying they are unhappy with their work-life balance is falling. Although net labour participation is very high, the actual number of hours worked per week is one of the lowest within the EU.

Labour market shortages are reflected in employees’ concerns about job security, which are on a downward trend. That said, the proportion of those with concerns about their jobs was slightly higher in 2024 than in 2023. The proportion of those in work who are able to take independent decisions about how they do their jobs is also on an upward trend, although there was a fall in 2024.

The distribution of well-being across different population groups shows that in general, those with a higher professional and university education achieve higher well-being in many areas of society. A relatively high proportion of Dutch people have higher professional or university qualifications. This proportion rose further in 2024 to 37 percent of people aged 15 to 74. Although the contribution of educational level to well-being is inferred from the relative size of the higher professional and university educated population, this obviously does not detract from the importance of other forms of education, such as vocational education, apprenticeships and informal learning.

The dashboard shows that nearly 94 percent of children aged 4 and over are in preschool education, that relatively few pupils drop out of school early and that in 2023, a quarter of Dutch people aged 25 to 74 had been enrolled in a form of education in the four weeks prior to being questioned.

Digital skills are becoming ever more important to enable people to participate socially and economically. In the Netherlands, a relatively large proportion of people have taken up opportunities to develop digital skills. Nearly 83 percent of those aged between 16 and 74 have at least basic digital skills, putting the Netherlands in first place in the EU in this respect in 2023. A notable finding is the rising trend in satisfaction with educational opportunities: in 2024, 84.1 percent of the population were satisfied on this indicator. Current shortages in the labour market may be a factor in this regard, with employers giving their existing staff opportunities to take part in education and training. Set against these favourable developments in terms of well-being are the results of the PISA study. Although it does not contain enough data points to calculate the medium-term trend, it does reveal that the scores for reading and maths skills of Dutch 15-year-olds have declined.