Dutch Spending Has Doubled Over 50 Years, Keeping NL 4th in the EU for GDP
New CBS figures show that Dutch consumption per person is now twice as high as half a century ago, and that the Netherlands holds onto its fourth place in the European Union for GDP per capita.
The average person in the Netherlands now spends about twice as much per year as in the 1970s, even after correcting for inflation, according to new figures released by Dutch statistics agency CBS this week. At the same time, the Netherlands has retained its fourth place in the European Union for gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, behind Luxembourg, Ireland and Denmark.
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The 50-year view
GDP per capita measures the total value of everything a country produces in a year, divided by the number of inhabitants. In the Netherlands, that figure was around €65,000 in 2025, a growth of 1.3 percent compared with the year before, and roughly one and a half times the EU average.
The longer-term picture, however, is even more striking. According to CBS chief economist Peter Hein van Mulligen, the average Dutch resident’s real consumption, what people actually use in goods and services over a year, has doubled compared with the early 1970s. The figure now stands at around €34,000 per person per year.
That growth, Van Mulligen notes, reflects both higher wages and a growing economy. It also changes what counts as “luxury.” “What was considered a luxury fifty years ago, such as flying, is now perfectly normal for many people,” he said.
The CBS uses a measure called “actual individual consumption” to track this. Unlike a narrow look at household spending, it also includes consumption of goods and services that the government finances directly for people, such as much of healthcare and education. That makes the figure easier to compare across countries with different welfare systems.
Fourth in GDP, second in spending
Despite ranking fourth in the EU on GDP per capita, the Netherlands ranks second on consumption per person, just behind Luxembourg, with Belgium and Ireland following close behind. The EU average is around €27,000. The figures are corrected for differences in price levels between countries.
The gap between the Dutch GDP and consumption rankings illustrates a quirk in the data. Countries such as Luxembourg and Ireland post very high GDP per capita partly because of factors that do not directly translate into the welfare of their residents. Luxembourg’s GDP is inflated by large numbers of cross-border commuters and a heavy financial sector. Ireland’s by international companies, many of them American tech and pharmaceutical firms, that book large amounts of revenue there. As a share of GDP, individual consumption in those countries is comparatively low.
By contrast, in the Netherlands, individual consumption accounts for about 60 percent of GDP, against 66 percent across the EU as a whole.
Long-term, not short-term, growth
Van Mulligen stressed that, over time, consumption growth and economic growth tend to move together. “Sometimes income growth runs ahead of economic growth, sometimes it falls behind, but in the end they always meet up again,” he said.
That long-term view sits in some contrast with shorter-term consumption trends in the Netherlands. After two months of decline in early 2026, Dutch household consumption grew again by 0.9 percent in March compared with the same month a year earlier, according to separate CBS data.
For now, however, the headline picture remains favourable. By international comparison, residents of the Netherlands enjoy one of the highest levels of consumption in the EU, even if the country sits just outside the top three by GDP per capita. And measured against the early 1970s, the everyday material standard of living has roughly doubled.