More than 485,000 people in the Netherlands received government-funded housing assistance through the Social Welfare Act (Wmo) in the first half of this year. This is 27 percent more than in the same period in 2019. In total, more than 1.1 million people in the Netherlands received assistance from WMO; this is up 10 percent in four years. Statistics Netherlands reports this based on preliminary figures.
Through Wmo, people can get help with household chores and home care. This can be used, for example, to pay for a wheelchair or stairlift, to help with daily personal care or household chores. What is striking is that the number of beneficiaries of this right, especially among wealthy households, increased significantly only in the second category.
Everyone pays the same
Since 2019, people with high incomes (gross annual income over 40,000 euros) are increasingly benefiting from municipal housing benefits: an increase of almost 114 percent was recorded in this group. There was also a significant increase of 69 percent (over €20,000) among middle-income earners. Low-income people almost never need help around the house anymore.
This may be related to a change that came into force in 2019: the income-based contribution for Wmo usage was replaced by a subscription price that is the same for everyone, i.e. 19 euros per month.
Source: NOS
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