Organisational innovations in the Netherlands

The Netherlands have shown some major technological and economical changes in the field of new production forms and organisation and labour-related innovations. As in other European countries, some autonomous developments like economic developments partly determine the work organisation and the type of work to be performed. The Dutch workforce will grow significantly in the coming years. The main reasons for this growth is the ageing of the workforce, a relatively higher influx of younger workers (in comparison to other European countries) and the immigration rates. The proportion of elderly workers in the overall workforce will increase sharply. All policies are oriented at trying to keep older workers at work. Educational attainment has been rising quite steadily. This growth has been tampered by the influx of low educated immigrant workers. This development will lead to more tensions on the labour market, since eventually it may lead to a segregation of the workforce between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ or put more exactly between the ‘cans’ and the ‘can nots’