CBS shows support for bounded labour migration, while employers face housing, payroll and agency pressure.
On Thursday afternoon, the owner of a small packing business has two sick calls, one Belgian order still to ship, and an agency offering three workers if he confirms today. The pressure is immediate. The policy debate feels far away. Yet that is exactly where the debate lands, inside a roster, a payslip and a supplier file.
The signal has to become readable
CBS reported on 8 June 2026 that 68 percent of Dutch adults want the Netherlands to admit labour migrants, but only with a maximum number. Another 17 percent would admit all labour migrants. Twelve percent want as few as possible, and 3 percent want none.
Among people who support admission with or without limits, 82.3 percent accept both low-paid and high-paid labour migrants. That points to conditional acceptance. Many people see the need for foreign workers. They also expect limits, housing realism and clean handling.
For a small employer, the question is not only whether people can be found. It is whether the full route can be carried properly.
The shortage is real, but cooler
CBS counted 378,000 open vacancies at the end of the first quarter of 2026. That came to 91 vacancies for every 100 unemployed people. Care, trade and business services together held more than half of those vacancies.
Anyone running a shop, care team, workshop, kitchen or delivery operation knows what that feels like. Roster gaps become longer waiting times. Training gets compressed. Supervisors stretch. Owners step back into work they thought they had delegated.
Still, this is not the overheated market of 2022. Vacancies have fallen in almost every quarter since the third quarter of that year. Pressure remains, but it is more selective. Some companies cannot find people. Others hesitate because demand is softer, costs are higher and customers resist price increases.
Another figure deserves attention. In the first quarter of 2026, 574,000 employed people wanted to work more hours and were available. They wanted an average of 8.5 extra hours a week.
That will not fill every night shift or warehouse peak. Skills, distance and family schedules still matter. Yet it means foreign recruitment should not be the first reflex in every company. Roster design, contract size, training, wage level and automation belong in the same conversation.
What the signal changes
In April 2026, almost two-thirds of companies reported staff shortages. More firms moved toward automation or better employer appeal than toward more workers from abroad. Only 9.9 percent used that route. The market is tight. Employers are already looking for other levers.
Agency work is a supplier file
CBS also shows why agency labour needs closer control. In 2024, 52.4 percent of agency-worker jobs were filled by workers born abroad. Agency work remains one of the main routes through which migrant labour reaches Dutch companies.
That brings flexibility. It also creates distance. Who recruited the worker? Who explained the job? Who arranges transport? Where does the worker sleep? Who deducts what from wages? Which papers stay with the agency, and which facts does the user company actually see?
That distance is becoming harder to justify. The Wet toelating terbeschikkingstelling van arbeidskrachten enters into force on 1 January 2027. From 1 January 2028, the Nederlandse Arbeidsinspectie will enforce the admission rules for labour suppliers. Fines can hit both suppliers without admission and user companies that work with them.
The government also opened consultation on 22 May 2026 on a care duty for BRP registration of labour migrants supplied by temporary work agencies, secondment firms and payroll companies. For workers who stay longer than four months, municipal registration must happen within five days of arrival.
For large firms, this will become another procurement layer. For small firms, it is more personal. The owner who used to judge an agency by speed and hourly price needs a sharper conversation. A cheap agency that cannot explain housing, pay and registration is not cheap. It is unfinished risk.
Housing and payroll decide whether the route holds
The CBS opinion survey explains why housing sits at the center. 74.8 percent of adults think labour migration can solve staff shortages in certain sectors. At the same time, 61.8 percent think it will reduce housing availability for people already living in the Netherlands.
That concern meets a hard market. Municipalities issued permits for 3,089 temporary dwellings in 2025, 50 percent fewer than in 2024. Only 117 of those permitted temporary dwellings were specifically intended for labour migrants.
A worker without a stable room is not stable capacity. The government has kept the possibility for employers to charge up to 25 percent of the minimum wage for certified housing costs. That keeps a lawful route open in a tight housing market. It also keeps work and housing closely tied.
The Nederlandse Arbeidsinspectie has described stacked earning models around recruitment, housing, transport and dismissal. That matters most where the worker depends on the same chain for the job, the room and the ride to work.
What founders should check
Payroll adds another layer. From 1 January 2026, living costs in the Netherlands and private phone costs with the home country no longer fall within the tax-free ETK arrangement. The government expects the change to reduce net pay by about €85 over an average 18-week stay, or about €20 a month.
That sounds small until it hits a low-paid worker who accepted the job on a take-home calculation. The worker remembers the promise. The payslip tells the truth. If those two do not match, the business may lose the person it hired to solve the shortage.
The controlled hour
When the packing business owner looks again at the agency offer, the hourly rate is only the beginning. The real question is the controlled hour: agency price, supervision time, training, transport, housing route, payroll effect, worker turnover, registration, supplier admission and the cost of losing people during a peak week.
Cash still draws the boundary. CBS reported that business confidence was negative across sectors at the start of the second quarter of 2026, while more companies expected selling prices to rise. A business may need labour. Customers may not accept the full cost.
This is where market reality, governance and the ledger meet. Labour migration can protect turnover. It can keep orders moving, care visits staffed and shops open. But it is not a reserve of hands outside ordinary business discipline. It comes through people, rooms, contracts, payslips, municipalities and agencies.
The calm answer is not to avoid foreign recruitment. Many Dutch businesses and sectors already depend on it, and many workers build serious lives here. The answer is to treat it as a full operating decision, not as a quick fix for a roster gap.
The better board questions are practical. Can existing staff work more hours? Is automation cheaper than repeated emergency hiring? Is the agency preparing for the admission system? Is housing certified where deductions are made? Does payroll match the offer? Can the company explain why this route is needed?
Thursday afternoon pressure will not disappear. Orders still need to leave. Patients still need care. Customers still expect service. But the business that answers shortage with clear work, clean pay and a visible housing route will stand better than the one that only fills the shift.
Labour scarcity is a market problem. In 2026, labour migration is also a discipline problem. The firms that understand both will make better decisions, and quieter ones.
Sources
- CBS source
- CBS – Current labour-market tightness
- CBS – Regional labour-market pressure
- CBS – Unused domestic working hours
- CBS – Employer response to staff shortages
- CBS – Foreign-born workers in agency work
- CBS – Scale of migrant labour in employee jobs
- CBS – Business confidence and demand risk
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