The Two Bills
Every American knows Dutch taxes are higher. Almost nobody has priced the second American bill, the one you pay because taxes did not cover the thing. This puts them side by side.
Not tax advice. Arithmetic on your own receipts.
Dutch income tax is genuinely higher than American income tax for most people. In exchange, several of the biggest private bills in American life shrink or disappear: health insurance runs about €157 a month per adult by the government's own figure, €159.30 by the comparison sites, with out of pocket costs capped at €385 a year and children covered free. University tuition is €2,694 a year at the statutory rate, but that rate is tied to nationality or to a permit that grants student finance rights, and families who do not qualify pay an institutional rate commonly between €10,000 and €22,000. Whether the trade favors you depends on which private bills you currently pay, which is what this page adds up.
Monthly dollars unless a field says otherwise.
The average American worker pays $571 a month toward family coverage, $120 for single coverage. Yours may be very different, which is the point of asking.
The average single deductible is $1,886. Enter what you actually spent last year, not the plan number.
Whatever you actually pay. Zero is a valid answer.
Payment, insurance, gas, repairs, all of it, for every car the household runs.
Whatever goes into the 529 or the someday fund.
Therapy the plan will not cover, the dental work, the ambulance fund.
Prefilled where a verified number exists. Change any of it.
The 2026 average for basic cover: €157 by the government's own figure, €159.30 by the comparison sites.
Out of pocket is capped at €385 a year per adult for basic care, your family doctor is exempt from even that, and children are insured free until 18.
The cap, times the number of adults. Lower it if you expect to spend less.
Often heavily subsidized through the childcare benefit, and the subsidy depends on income, so enter a guess and mark it soft.
Many Dutch households run one car or none. Enter the version of your life you actually expect.
Pick the rate that is actually yours below, or type your own. Zero if no kids or they are grown.
The famous low Dutch tuition is tied to nationality or to a residence permit that grants student finance rights. Arriving on a temporary self-employment permit, your family may well pay the institutional rate, which is a different order of number. It is still usually below American private tuition. It is not the number you were promised on the internet.
Same question, the Dutch version of the answer.
For your household the private bills do not shrink much. That is real information, and it usually means low current health costs, no childcare, and a car light life already.
This is the ongoing life. The one-time bill of the move itself lives at The Real Cost.
The half this page does not compute
Dutch income tax and the 21 percent sales tax are real and higher, and depending on your income the total tax difference can be substantial. This ledger prices the private side of the trade only. A cross border tax advisor prices the other half, and both halves matter.