A social agreement, presented as "unique"; was signed on October 7, 2008 during the traditional fall negotiations between the social partners and the government. The Federation of Dutch trade unions (FNV) will not ask for more than 3.5% for next year's wage increases, following the government's call for wage moderation. (Ref. 080769)
In exchange for wage moderation, the government promised to remove employees’ contribution to unemployment insurance, which means that €2 billion will not be paid. For instance, employees with an annual income of €30.000 will get €20 more each month. The government was only willing to adopt this measure if VAT was simultaneously raised from 19 to 20%. Because of inflation, which should amount to 2.75% in 2008 and 3.25% in 2009, the authorities finally gave up this VAT increase. In 2009, the sta
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