ABSTRACT
The Dutch government introduced, as early as 1968, a compulsory insurance meant to finance healthcare costs deemed as 'uninsurable' under the regular healthcare insurance system. This chapter scrutinizes how care work has been framed and understood in the debate on the long-term care (LTC) reforms, and how the latter are likely to transform care employment, the meaning and boundaries of different forms of care work and the position of care workers. It explains rationale of the recent reforms and how care work has been framed in the debate. The chapter focuses on the transformations of care work as a consequence of the 2007 reforms onwards, by looking at policy evaluations, labour market data, analyses and forecasts. Job losses and the reduced employability in care of lower-qualified women were considered as an inevitable 'evil'. The chapter outlines the strong link between care employment and care policies in the Netherlands.
