Wage tax and brackets

One combined withholding, not two deductions

In the Netherlands your employer withholds a single figure from your gross pay each month, the loonheffing (wage tax). It looks like one number on your payslip, but it fuses two things: the income tax (loonbelasting) and the national-insurance contributions (premies volksverzekeringen). Because they are levied together as one combined tariff, the contributions are not a separate line that comes off your pay a second time — they already sit inside the tariff. The figures on this page are those in force for 2026; nobody has signed them off.

This calculator covers the standard case: employment income (box 1) for someone below the state-pension (AOW) age, with one employer applying the payroll tax credit. It does not model pension-scheme premiums deducted from the taxable base, the AOW-age brackets, or the 30% ruling — those are deliberate, disclosed simplifications for this version.

The three combined brackets (box 1)

The combined tariff is progressive: it climbs in three brackets, and a higher rate applies only to the slice of income above each threshold, never to the whole salary. For 2026 the brackets run:

• 35,75% on income up to € 38.883 — the first bracket, which contains both the income-tax slice (8,10%) and the 27,65% national-insurance contributions.
• 37,56% on income between € 38.883 and € 78.426 — the middle bracket, income tax only (the contributions are capped at the top of the first bracket).
• 49,50% on income above € 78.426 — the top bracket.

So the effective rate you actually pay is a blend of all three, always lower than the top bracket you reach. The split of the first bracket into an 8,10% tax slice and the 27,65% contributions is set out on the contributions page. The combined bracket rates are corroborated (Deloitte and Accountancy Vanmorgen matching the Belastingdienst overview); the primary Staatscourant text is not quoted directly here.

The tax credits are curves, not a flat discount

This is where the Dutch system surprises people. After the tariff produces a raw tax figure, two tax credits (heffingskortingen) are subtracted from it. They are not flat amounts — each one is an income-dependent curve, and together they are the reason your net pay rises more slowly than your gross. The wage tax is the tariff minus both credits, and it can never go below zero: if the credits exceed the tax, the surplus is not paid out through payroll.

The general tax credit (algemene heffingskorting) is worth up to € 3.115 at lower incomes. From about € 29.736 it phases out at a rate of 6,398% of the income above that point, reaching zero by the time income approaches the top of the second bracket (€ 78.426). So every euro you earn in that band shrinks the credit — which is a hidden rise in your effective rate.

The employment tax credit (arbeidskorting) rewards working income and moves in stages: it builds up steeply from the first euro (starting at 8,324%, then 31,009% through the € 11.965–€ 25.845 band, then a gentle 1,95%) until it peaks at € 5.685 around an income of € 45.592. Above that it phases out at 6,51%, reaching zero near € 132.920. The build-up helps lower and middle earners the most; the phase-out is another reason the marginal rate bends upward in the middle of the scale. Both credit tables are taken verbatim from the Belastingdienst 2026 tables.

What the calculator shows

The calculator makes this legible: it shows the income-tax and contributions portions of the tariff, then the two credits as separate subtracted lines that push your net pay back up. It also lets you switch the payroll tax credit off — the situation for a second job, where this employer does not apply the credits — so you can see how much of your net depends on them. For a pure-salary case this version treats your annual taxable pay as the income base for both credits, a disclosed simplification.