Assessing Dutch Fiscal and Debt Sustainability

Abstract

Although the Netherlands entered the so-called Great Lockdown with a strong fiscal position, the Dutch fiscal balance is projected to deteriorate by an unprecedented magnitude, largely as a result of necessary fiscal measures deployed to weather the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper performs a stochastic analysis of risks to Dutch fiscal and debt sustainability over the next decade, taking into account alternative recovery scenarios and associated fiscal consolidation paths and also a range of macroeconomic shocks drawn from the historical experience of the Netherlands. The simulations show that even under significant downturn scenarios and assuming an initially less favorable fiscal position due to persistent economic effects of the pandemic, risks to the Dutch fiscal and debt sustainability would remain contained.