Author: Job van Hussen
Publication: 10-04-2024
In a country where everything is becoming increasingly unaffordable, public transport (OV) is not spared. This while public transport should be the basis of affordable mobility*. Accessible and affordable public transport should be a basic right in a country like the Netherlands. It is imperative that we change the way we get from A to B, and fast.
Justice through mobility
Author: Paula Smith and Vincent Heerink
Publication: 31-07-2024
Paula Smith, lecturer in Social Work & researcher at the Empowerment and Professionalisation lectorate at Inholland University of Applied Sciences in the Netherlands, and Vincent Heerink, project manager at the VoorUit foundation and member of DWARS's economics committee, come up with a gripping opinion in response to a piece by Tim 'S Jongers, director of the Wiardi Beckman Foundation, the PvdA's scientific bureau.
Opinion in the Morning
Author: Noor Ijpma
Publication: 22-02-2024
Degrowth. Degrowth. After the obsession with economic growth over the past 40 years, this sounds absurd to many. How can you possibly solve the major current problems and crises by stopping, or even reversing, economic growth! Yet the alternative - fighting the climate crisis through economic growth - is totally unfeasible if you look at the state of the earth.
Opinion: Degrowth, because the alternative doesn't work
Deepening: Economic growth withholding
Author: Stein Jonker and Wessel Fonck
Publication: 10-07-2023
After the Lower House approved the new pension law, it has now also passed through the Senate. For many, the pension act is still very unclear, even though it is very important. Therefore, the Economy Committee will explain the basics of the new pension law to you in Jip-and-janneke language.
How the new pension system works
Author: Douwe Kuipers and Wessel Fonck
Publication: 10-06-2023 (physical bundle OverDWARS)
On 1 October 2021, the government made online gambling legal. Where previously you could only go to the casino to legally play roulette, blackjack and poker, this is now also possible online. Gambling has been a popular form of entertainment for thousands of years, but this legalisation creates a whole new dynamic in the gambling market. Time for a critical review.
Fuck gambling
Author: Job van Hussen
Publication: 10-12-2022
Confidence in some cryptocurrencies has fallen hard recently. Recently, the crypto currency LunaTerra, formerly one of the larger and promising digital coins, entered the market for virtually zero dollars. Cryptocurrencies were touted for a long time as a way to get rich quick. As long as Bitcoin was showing nothing but growth, the platform was also growing all the time. More and more people started betting money on one or more of the many cryptocurrencies. The rich could invest their capital to keep it growing and the less wealthy saw it as an opportunity to quickly arrange a better life for themselves. Nothing could be further from the truth when the bubble burst in early 2022. Even now, the future seems uncertain for many investors.
Cryptocurrencies Deciphered
Author: Raoel Haas & Vincent Heerink
Publication: 2022
The Netherlands is in the biggest housing crisis since World War II, but the solutions put forward are based on a structural misunderstanding. Historically in the Netherlands, the housing problem has never been solved by the free market. Treating housing as "a housing market" has major, damaging consequences for virtually everyone except private housing providers. Although housing is a right, Dutch people experience unnecessary stress and costs. Poverty and inequality are played into its hands. This essay argues that government intervention and the presence of housing corporations ensures much more stable and affordable housing, than when housing is left to the free market.
Why the housing market always fails
Author: Wessel Fonck
Publication: 01-11-2022
In April 2019, the FNV came out with the action to raise the minimum wage to 14 euros. Because the union has to stay in talks with employers, they cannot make "radical" demands. Corporate profits have been rising faster than wages for 40 years. This needs to be rectified. That is why the economy committee is making a proposal at the Winter Congress 2022 for an extra euro per hour and we want today what 15 euros was worth in 2019. That extra euro is needed to give people a decent income. Precisely because this has come under increasing pressure in recent years.
Why is the extra euro really needed?
Author: Wessel Fonck, Youri Zuyderwijk & Vincent Heerink
Publication: 18-05-2022
This article is part of a two-part series on emissions trading by the Economy Committee. In the first article "How does emissions trading work?", we explained how emissions trading works (specifically in Europe) and what the current situation is. This article will show exactly what the Economy Committee itself thinks of emissions trading. We will go into detail about pros and cons of the system and also discuss some alternatives. The committee believes that emissions trading systems have good potential as part of plans to fairly price and greatly reduce emissions.
The Future of Emissions Trading
Author: Economy Committee
Publication: 12-05-2022
The ideology of neoliberalism has done a lot of damage. Senna Maatoug and Hans Rodenburg write that there should be an end to the fixation on economic growth, GDP and unemployment figures - so-called economism. Instead, it should be about the things that are really valuable, such as our well-being. Moreover, the authors rightly note that a concrete, proper vision of the economy from the political left has largely failed to materialise. Criticism of the current capitalist system is justified and crucial, but thinking about a system that does work, and thinking about how to get there, is at least as important.
Author: Wessel Fonck & Youri Zuyderwijk
Publication: 29-03-2022
The whole world has a goal of greatly reducing CO2 emissions. One way to do this is through emissions trading.
Emissions trading is an important part of climate policy at European level and also features in the Paris climate agreement. In this first article of a two-part series, DWARS's Economics Committee takes you through the jungle of emissions trading. Here we explain step by step what emissions trading is and what systems are in place: European and global. In the follow-up article, we reveal our views on the emissions trading systems. In the end, we hereby make suggestions on what should change in the future to improve these systems.
Author: Douwe Kuipers & Alma Liezenga
Publication: 13-01-2022
Why is it that some countries in the world seem to be developing with difficulty, resulting in serious social problems? And where should we look for solutions? In previous articles, as DWARS's Economics Committee, we have discussed a number of problems facing developing economies. These problems are sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly linked to the foreign and trade policies of the Netherlands and other western countries. After talking about debt trap diplomacy, capital flight and the resource curse, we want to end the series hopeful. How can we move developing economies forward in a sustainable and equitable way?
Developing Economies: Concluding article
Author: Douwe Kuipers
Publication: 06-08-2021
Nobody is against development in countries where people previously often lived in poverty. But in some countries, such economic development is proceeding with difficulty. Economy Committee of DWARS has discussed a number of problems of developing economies. These problems are sometimes indirect, sometimes directly linked to the foreign and trade policies of the Netherlands, among others. Then it turns out that globalisation is not the fair race promised by some economists. In this piece: the resource curse.
Developing Economies: "Resource Curse"
Author: Douwe Kuipers
Publication: 21-05-2021
Nobody is against development in countries where people previously often lived in poverty. But in some countries, such economic development is proceeding with difficulty. Economy Committee of DWARS has discussed a number of problems of developing economies. These problems are sometimes indirect, sometimes directly linked to the foreign and trade policies of the Netherlands, among others. Then it turns out that globalisation is not the fair race promised by some economists. In this piece: capital flight.
Developing Economies: Capital flight
Author: Douwe Kuipers
Publication: 25-04-2021
Nobody is against development in countries where people previously often lived in poverty. But in some countries, such economic development is proceeding with difficulty. Economy Committee of DWARS has discussed a number of problems of developing economies. These problems are sometimes indirectly, sometimes directly linked to the foreign and trade policies of the Netherlands, among others. Then it turns out that globalisation is not the fair race promised by some economists. In this piece: debt trap diplomacy.
Developing Economies: "Debt Trap Diplomacy"
Author: Economy & Finance Committee
Publication: 17-06-2018 (Adopted at Summer Congress 2018)
With the introduction of the euro, European countries not only dissolved their geographical and economic, but also their monetary borders. Where the euro promised stability, prosperity and solidarity, the opposite became true. Major problems emerged in 2008, the year of the credit crisis. Drastic measures were needed to keep the euro afloat. Now the crisis seems to be over, but what is needed to prevent another crisis? How can we solve the underlying problems?
Vision paper: the future of the euro
Author: Economy & Finance Committee
Publication: 04-2015 (Adopted at Summer Congress 2015)
In today's society, the economy is central: growth is sacred and everyone has to work. Some people have to have multiple jobs to make ends meet, but what is growth really for? The Netherlands must move towards a society where the focus is not on the economy, but on people. Where everyone is free and has their basic needs met. A basic income can provide this. A basic income gives everyone security. Not only workers, but also, for example, starting entrepreneurs, volunteers or students. How does a basic income work and how can we implement it?
Vision piece: a basis of existence (basic income)