The asylum migrant becomes a labor migrant and employers cheer. Is the history of guest workers repeating itself?

It seems obvious. The growth of the Dutch economy is followed after some time by growth in labor migration and vice versa. If the economy shrinks, labor migration shrinks. The Central Planning Bureau (CPB) established the connection in a study earlier this month and it is then a political fact.

A political fact that forces political decision-making. For example, recently two experts, Hein de Haas and Jan van de Beek, were regular authors Wynia’s Week, at the table with the informants and the four parties to give their vision. After all, the outcome of the House of Representatives elections on November 22 last year was also an anti-migration vote.

Logic is unrelenting

The CPB’s research not only seems obvious, it is also obvious. The logic is inexorable. Economic growth creates additional demand for workers, unemployment is falling, employers are looking for new people, even further away. And that can be done easily. There is a large European labor market. Employees from outside Europe are also easy to recruit, despite the paper regulations, about which more later.

In 2022, the NBBU, one of the trade organizations of temporary employment agencies, counted 984,169 migrant workers in the Netherlands. About three-quarters of them work in logistics (such as distribution centers), horticulture and the food industry. So-called knowledge workers from outside the European Union, for which separate rules apply, such as IT specialists from India or American marketing toppers, are not included in these figures. In 2021, according to statistics agency CBS, around 40,000 knowledge migrants lived in the Netherlands.

The workplace of migrant workers partly explains the contradictions between political parties. In short: BBB and VVD see added value, NSC and PVV want to put on the brakes.

Companies and temporary employment agencies conduct a permanent lobby in favor of labor migration. In the run-up to the House of Representatives elections, entrepreneur Frank van Gool, founder of Otto Workforce, attracted attention with his donation of 100,000 euros to the VVD. After the elections, international companies and universities led an influential lobby against the reduction of the so-called expat scheme, which gives knowledge workers a tax advantage over their Dutch colleagues.

We will hear from the lobbies again in the near future. Because the labor market remains tight and the economy is overheated. Last week, the outgoing RutteVier cabinet lowered the unemployment estimate in its spring memorandum, a preview of the 2025 budget.

But there is help from an unexpected source. The Council of State lifted restrictions on work by asylum migrants at the end of last year. It becomes easier for employers to hire them and that is happening. “Due to the tightness on the labor market, there is a great demand from employers to admit migrant workers for work,” notes the benefit organization UWV in its annual report published last week. Last year, the UWV granted 2,000 work permits for asylum seekers. In 2022 that was about 600.

Differences fade

You can map out what is already happening and what will happen. As a result of the labor market shortage and the liberalization by the Council of State, the asylum migrant who wants to earn something becomes a labor migrant. The differences between these two groups will fade.

Advocates of migration consistently point out that migrant workers not only play a useful role in the economy, but are also here temporarily. That would distinguish them from asylum migrants. Another difference: asylum migrants are not attracted by jobs. They come to the Netherlands in smaller numbers than labor migrants, so the investments in their reception and integration are therefore less expensive.

But if these two groups coincide, because asylum seekers also start working before they have residence status, what then? Do you then get higher numbers and an (even?) smaller chance of rejecting an asylum application because the people involved have already built up rights based on their work status?

[google_Display_2]

These questions – apart from the growing social costs – are extra pressing because reports of abuses in working conditions and housing and violations of rules by employers continue to persist. In contrast to the giant pro-migration lobby, the advocates of decent employment practices are small in practice.

For example, a few weeks ago the Labor Inspectorate reported on the abuse of the scheme for knowledge migrants. There is hardly any supervision of the implementation. For example, employers requested and received permission to hire hairdressers, cable layers, cleaners, concrete braiders, payrollers, catering employees and nail salon employees as knowledge workers.

History repeats itself

The zeal of employers to hire labor and asylum migrants has been seen before. In the late 1960s, employers recruited guest workers, sometimes with active government support. The assumption was that they would work temporarily in industry and textiles. When these sectors were wiped out in the following decade, they preferred to stay in the Netherlands.

The chance of recurrence is crystal clear. The Netherlands would like to be a knowledge economy, but labor and asylum migrants generally do not fit the profile of a highly educated, highly productive workforce.

My free tip at the formation table, thanks to the CPB research: curtail the flexibility of employment contracts. Permanent jobs and permanent contracts make the Netherlands less attractive for employers who hire migrant workers. And as a bonus: politicians who insist on this take their anti-migration voters seriously and they strengthen their socio-economic ‘left-wing’ image in favor of greater social security.

Menno Tammingais an economic columnist for Wynia’s Week. He was previously editor and columnist of Het Financieele Dagblad and NRC Handelsblad. 

Wynia’s Weekis made possible by readers’ voluntarily paid subscriptions. Are you already participating? You can donate to Wynia’s WeekHERE. Thank you!