Let’s Start with the Headline Everyone’s Clapping For

“Household real disposable income rose by 2.2% in Q1 2025 compared to a year earlier.”

The statisticians at CBS want us to nod approvingly. Politicians want us to tweet it. Economists want to call it a recovery. But if you’ve been paying attention to how systems actually work—not just what they announce—then you already know what I’m about to say:

This 2.2% gain is not progress. It’s an anesthetic.

It soothes, it distracts, and it sedates a structurally exposed middle class into thinking it is regaining breathing space—when in fact, it's quietly financing its own suffocation.

The Why Behind the Numbers: Who’s Earning, and Who’s Owed?

Yes, employee compensation is up 6.5%. Yes, collective labor agreement (CLA) wages are 5.4% higher. Yes, benefits went up 6.3%, mostly thanks to a 6% increase in the minimum wage.

On paper, this looks like a healthy body gaining muscle. But it’s more like a dehydrated patient receiving IV fluids—momentarily stable, fundamentally fragile.

Here’s the deeper structure:

So yes—gross up, net barely better. And that’s before correcting for price inflation.

We didn’t get richer. We just got more entangled in a system where you earn more just to hand over more.

The Elephant in the Mortgage: €889.8 Billion and Counting

Meanwhile, mortgage debt rose by €11 billion in one quarter, now nearing €890 billion—but relax, they say, because “the debt ratio stayed the same.”

Yes, because GDP also grew.

That’s like telling a man drowning with a brick in his hand, “Don’t worry—the pool got deeper too.”

Mortgage-to-GDP ratio: 79.1%

That’s the lowest since 2001.

And yet: debt per household keeps rising, because house prices are up, not because homes are accessible.

More homes were sold, yes—but to whom?

Let’s be blunt: not to first-time buyers. Not to the teacher, the nurse, or the skilled freelancer. These homes are assets, not shelters. They’re part of a financial ecosystem that is thriving on the illusion of affordability.

Why This Is a Structural Risk, Not a Statistical Insight

The so-called "resilience" of Dutch households is the resilience of normalized debt bondage.

We are being applauded for managing to walk a tightrope while the rope itself is being stretched by inflation, taxation, housing scarcity, and systemic opacity.

The structure is cannibalizing liquidity:

• The 6.5% increase in compensation is barely outpacing the 4.8% rise in taxes.
• The increase in real disposable income is entirely absorbed by rising housing, health, energy, and insurance costs.
• The debt expansion masks stagnation in disposable liquidity, making families more exposed to rate shocks, job loss, and policy shifts.

So What’s the Story Beneath the Story?

What this quarter reveals is not improvement—it’s micro-stabilization inside a macro-distortion. The engine is running, but the fuel is toxic:

✅ Yes, we have more nominal income.

❌ But we have no new breathing room.

✅ Yes, the debt ratio as a percentage looks stable.

❌ But absolute private debt is rising dangerously.

And here’s the brutal truth: We are normalizing it.

Final Reflection: Why You Shouldn’t Celebrate a 2.2% Increase

Because if you need a 6.5% raise to feel 2.2% freer, something is deeply broken.

Because the structure celebrates gains that don’t translate into margin.

Because every quarter that we applaud without scrutiny is another quarter we drift further from economic agency and deeper into behavioral compliance.

For Entrepreneurs, Risk Officers, and CEOs

If you believe this is a sign of recovery, you’re misreading the risk landscape.

If you're planning based on disposable income projections without tracking debt trajectories and behavioral liquidity, you're mispricing your own exposure.

If you want a system that protects—not blinds—its citizens and companies, you must first stop applauding mirages and start redesigning the map.