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The child benefit thing was a complete clusterfuck and racism was only part of it. Basically the tax service decided some people were scamming the child daycar

The child benefit thing was a complete clusterfuck and racism was only part of it. Basically the tax service decided some people were scamming the child daycare support system and turned on them. Any attempts to fight it from the parents were stonewalled and people were fined and got into massive debt and some even committed suicide. Most of them had done nothing wrong. The problem here is the Dutch tax system that has a "guilty unless proven innocent" setup. Then when it was brought to attention by some politicians they were stonewalled and eventually even sidelined. The mainstream politicians kept turning their eyes away. Eventually it did blow up in the media. The government fell. However the same people that turned a blind eye are now incumbent to government once again. The whistleblowers were rewarded with a snarky remark to "find a function elsewhere". The racism here is bad but it's only the tip of the iceberg.

drukenemo 5y ago
I’m an immigrant to the Netherlands and have lived here for more than 10 years. I don’t recollect ever experiencing racism. At the same time, I think there are demographics in this country that are more likely to abuse the system or display behavior that make one a little more suspicious of them in principle. That said, country profiling by the government, as much as it would probably be an effective dimension to detect fraud imo, shouldn’t be used by a government. The same way airport control shouldn’t profile people by appearance or any racial and gender characteristics.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  I think the problem is that it’s only effective in the short term to profile like that. If you already consider someone guilty before they do anything, there’s very little stopping them from actually doing the thing for real (at least, I would have few moral qualms).
- iovrthoughtthis 5y ago
  > At the same time, I think there are demographics in this country that are more likely to abuse the system or display behavior that make one a little more suspicious of them in principle. i want to gently point out, without implying intention, that this is, in it's self, a racist belief
  - ndosnfiwjaijx 5y ago
  - djbebs 5y ago
    It's also true. Split any number of people into any arbitrary groups and some of those groups will be higher than average and other lower than average. This has nothing to do with race, and everything to do with randomness.
    - pasabagi 5y ago
      > Split any number of people into any arbitrary groups and some of those groups will be higher than average and other lower than average. Wait, what? Surely they should all be (sans a bit of noise) the same? (Split 1000 random numbers into two groups. The sums should be almost equal).
      - unionpivo 5y ago
        no if you take big enough group it will average out. But random numbers can and do have "random distribution" which means some high some low, most somewhere in between. But that only works with large enough sample. With small sample size, randomness can look like not random.
  - emteycz 5y ago
    How do you know they demographics they are talking about are defined by race?
- psKama 5y ago
  >At the same time, I think there are demographics in this country that are more likely to abuse the system or display behavior that make one a little more suspicious of them in principle. I have zero intention to engage in a useless discussion but I am startled to still see a comment like that. Yes, this is also exactly what they thought, and that's why they are called racist and got fined. You don't use statistical data to become more suspicious of individuals due to their race and discriminate against. How hard to understand this.
jsiepkes 5y ago
What you are leaving out is that this system was the reaction to a massive fraud before it. The same politicians who were screaming for a thougher stance on fraud are the same one now asking why there was such a though stance (Omtzigt being a good example). The fraud encompassed people from mainly eastern European countries (mainly Bulgaria, hence it is known as the "Bulgarenfraude" [1]) coming to the Netherlands, claiming (and getting) all kinds of benefits and then returning to their home country. By the time the tax service figured out they weren't entitled to the money they couldn't reclaim it because they were gone. It was basically a free money handout for them. Also a good deal of the people who got caught bitten by the thougher stance did actually commit fraud. At least the shady agencies which handled the benefits for these people (which those people themselves chose). Examples of these shady practices included things such as artifically inflating costs by making up expenses. EDIT: It is also interesting to note that the husband of the lawyer who got this ball rolling was the owner of such an agency. Numerious structural inconsistencies were found when this agency was investigated (structural falsification of hourly stats and so on)[2]. Basically what they did was telling people: "Does your kid sometimes stay at a familiy member? Well we think we found a way so you can get money for that" and then they handled the paper work and got a comission. That might have been the letter of the law but was definitly not the spirit of the law. [1] https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarenfraude https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarenfraude [2] https://www.tweedekamer.nl/downloads/document?id=3be75800-fbb7-4ec0-ba89-b6b719cda608&title=Bijlage%20bij%20vraag%2013%3A%20Casus%20Hawaii%20.pdf https://www.tweedekamer.nl/downloads/document?id=3be75800-fb...
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  I didn't really leave it out, I just don't think it's relevant. I don't think knowingly persecuting citizens (in bulk!) for something they did not commit is something that ever should happen. The tax service literally flagged people based on nothing and then pushed on without listening to any arguments from their side. This is not "tougher on fraud". This is just pure bullying to inflate "frauds caught" numbers, helped by the "guilty unless proven innocent" policy which is really unfair. Many of these innocent people are still waiting for compensation! Of course there were some that did commit fraud. And the current privatised system is really prone to abuse anyway. With the old state-run system every healthcare was given 'in kind' and there was no need for financial reimbursements. They should take money loop out of the system again. Then there will be no more scope for abuse in this way. All these dodgy agencies only cropped up to take advantage of the privatised system. And in many cases parents were not aware of their dodgy nature - in any case those agencies should be the ones being prosecuted, not the parents. But no real systemic changes were made. An apology to those affected, some promises for compensation they're still waiting on. And things are back as they always were.

drukenemo 5y ago

I’m an immigrant to the Netherlands and have lived here for more than 10 years. I don’t recollect ever experiencing racism. At the same time, I think there are demographics in this country that are more likely to abuse the system or display behavior that make one a little more suspicious of them in principle. That said, country profiling by the government, as much as it would probably be an effective dimension to detect fraud imo, shouldn’t be used by a government. The same way airport control shouldn’t profile people by appearance or any racial and gender characteristics.

Aeolun 5y ago
I think the problem is that it’s only effective in the short term to profile like that. If you already consider someone guilty before they do anything, there’s very little stopping them from actually doing the thing for real (at least, I would have few moral qualms).
iovrthoughtthis 5y ago
> At the same time, I think there are demographics in this country that are more likely to abuse the system or display behavior that make one a little more suspicious of them in principle. i want to gently point out, without implying intention, that this is, in it's self, a racist belief
- ndosnfiwjaijx 5y ago
- djbebs 5y ago
  It's also true. Split any number of people into any arbitrary groups and some of those groups will be higher than average and other lower than average. This has nothing to do with race, and everything to do with randomness.
  - pasabagi 5y ago
    > Split any number of people into any arbitrary groups and some of those groups will be higher than average and other lower than average. Wait, what? Surely they should all be (sans a bit of noise) the same? (Split 1000 random numbers into two groups. The sums should be almost equal).
    - unionpivo 5y ago
      no if you take big enough group it will average out. But random numbers can and do have "random distribution" which means some high some low, most somewhere in between. But that only works with large enough sample. With small sample size, randomness can look like not random.
- emteycz 5y ago
  How do you know they demographics they are talking about are defined by race?
psKama 5y ago
>At the same time, I think there are demographics in this country that are more likely to abuse the system or display behavior that make one a little more suspicious of them in principle. I have zero intention to engage in a useless discussion but I am startled to still see a comment like that. Yes, this is also exactly what they thought, and that's why they are called racist and got fined. You don't use statistical data to become more suspicious of individuals due to their race and discriminate against. How hard to understand this.

jsiepkes 5y ago

What you are leaving out is that this system was the reaction to a massive fraud before it. The same politicians who were screaming for a thougher stance on fraud are the same one now asking why there was such a though stance (Omtzigt being a good example). The fraud encompassed people from mainly eastern European countries (mainly Bulgaria, hence it is known as the "Bulgarenfraude" [1]) coming to the Netherlands, claiming (and getting) all kinds of benefits and then returning to their home country. By the time the tax service figured out they weren't entitled to the money they couldn't reclaim it because they were gone. It was basically a free money handout for them. Also a good deal of the people who got caught bitten by the thougher stance did actually commit fraud. At least the shady agencies which handled the benefits for these people (which those people themselves chose). Examples of these shady practices included things such as artifically inflating costs by making up expenses. EDIT: It is also interesting to note that the husband of the lawyer who got this ball rolling was the owner of such an agency. Numerious structural inconsistencies were found when this agency was investigated (structural falsification of hourly stats and so on)[2]. Basically what they did was telling people: "Does your kid sometimes stay at a familiy member? Well we think we found a way so you can get money for that" and then they handled the paper work and got a comission. That might have been the letter of the law but was definitly not the spirit of the law. [1] https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarenfraude https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarenfraude [2] https://www.tweedekamer.nl/downloads/document?id=3be75800-fbb7-4ec0-ba89-b6b719cda608&title=Bijlage%20bij%20vraag%2013%3A%20Casus%20Hawaii%20.pdf https://www.tweedekamer.nl/downloads/document?id=3be75800-fb...

GekkePrutser 5y ago
I didn't really leave it out, I just don't think it's relevant. I don't think knowingly persecuting citizens (in bulk!) for something they did not commit is something that ever should happen. The tax service literally flagged people based on nothing and then pushed on without listening to any arguments from their side. This is not "tougher on fraud". This is just pure bullying to inflate "frauds caught" numbers, helped by the "guilty unless proven innocent" policy which is really unfair. Many of these innocent people are still waiting for compensation! Of course there were some that did commit fraud. And the current privatised system is really prone to abuse anyway. With the old state-run system every healthcare was given 'in kind' and there was no need for financial reimbursements. They should take money loop out of the system again. Then there will be no more scope for abuse in this way. All these dodgy agencies only cropped up to take advantage of the privatised system. And in many cases parents were not aware of their dodgy nature - in any case those agencies should be the ones being prosecuted, not the parents. But no real systemic changes were made. An apology to those affected, some promises for compensation they're still waiting on. And things are back as they always were.