When the 30% ruling ends: the net-pay cliff, quantified
By Skyler Bissell · July 16, 2026 · 5 min read
Here is the part of the 30% ruling nobody frames as a warning: it stops. One month you are five years into the same Amsterdam job, same title, same salary, and your take-home drops by more than a thousand euros. Nothing on your contract changed. The tax you had been skipping simply came back.
The ruling is a five-year clock, not a permanent feature of your pay. So the real question is not just what it adds while it runs, but what it takes away when it ends. That number is knowable, and you should know it before you sign a lease.
TL;DR
- The cliff is the ruling's value, reversed. By cityparity's Amsterdam engine, take-home falls about €16,336 a year on a €100,000 salary and about €24,093 on €150,000 the moment the ruling expires.
- In monthly terms that is roughly €1,361 (on €100k) or €2,008 (on €150k) less, in the same job at the same gross. It arrives in a single step, the whole value at once.
- It can arrive before year five. Any earlier time you spent living or working in the Netherlands is subtracted from the clock.
- The fix is boring and it works: budget your rent and fixed costs on the post-ruling take-home from day one, so year six is a non-event instead of a shock.
Why there's a cliff and not a slope
The 30% ruling lets a qualifying inbound worker take up to 30% of gross as a tax-free allowance, which lowers the income your Dutch Box 1 tax is charged on. While it runs, your effective rate is low. When the maximum term ends, the allowance is gone in full, all at once. Your whole salary lands back in the tax base the next payroll cycle.
So it does not fade out over the last year. It is on, then it is off. That is what makes it a cliff: the drop is the entire value of the ruling, landing in a single step. The €100k worked example shows the two sides of that step side by side, €79,047 with the ruling against €62,711 without it.
The drop, quantified
Single filer, Amsterdam, income tax only, before living costs. The "after it ends" column is simply the same salary taxed with no allowance.
| Gross salary | Take-home with ruling | Take-home after it ends | Annual drop | Per month |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| €100,000 | €79,047 | €62,711 | −€16,336 (~21%) | −€1,361 |
| €150,000 | €109,910 | €85,818 | −€24,093 (~22%) | −€2,008 |
The percentage is the share of your with-ruling take-home that disappears. Roughly a fifth of your net pay, overnight, on the same paycheck.
What the cliff feels like
A €1,361 monthly drop on €100,000 is not a rounding error you absorb. It is a daycare place, or a big chunk of an Amsterdam rent, or the difference between saving and not. On €150,000 the €2,008 monthly step is a mortgage payment in most of the country.
The people it hurts are the ones who anchored their life to the year-one number: signed the lease the ruling could afford, bought the car the ruling could service, set the savings rate the ruling allowed. The salary never dropped, so it does not feel like something you planned for. It just quietly stops working in year six.
It can hit sooner than five years
The five-year maximum is exactly that, a maximum. Any period you already spent in the Netherlands as a resident or a cross-border worker gets deducted from the clock before it starts. Did a semester in Amsterdam, or a two-year posting a while back? That time comes off. Check the exact end date on your ruling decision (the beschikking) rather than counting five years from your start, because the tax office already did the subtraction and you want the same date they have.
2027 adds a smaller, earlier dip for some
Do not confuse the expiry cliff with the coming rate change. From 2027 the exemption drops from 30% to a flat 27% for the remaining term. That is a modest trim while the ruling is still running, well short of the full cliff. If your five years straddle 2027, you feel two separate things: a small step down to the 27% rate, then the full drop when the term finally ends. Anyone who started before 2024 is grandfathered and keeps the 30% rate. The mechanics of that change are in the explainer.
What to do about it
- Budget on the year-six number. Take the post-ruling take-home as your real, durable income and size rent, car, and savings against that. Treat the ruling years as a bonus to bank or invest. Don't build a fixed lifestyle on a temporary rate.
- Know your actual end date. Read it off the beschikking, since the tax office already did the subtraction. If prior Dutch time shortened your term, the cliff is closer than you think.
- Price a raise or a move against the drop. A €16,000 to €24,000 annual fall is a large negotiation target. When the cliff nears, a raise that merely offsets it is not a raise, and a competing offer that resets the picture is worth more than it looks.
- Judge the country, not the tax break. The ruling was always the smaller reason to be there. If the Netherlands only works with the ruling, it does not really work; if it works on the post-ruling number, the cliff is just a paperwork date.
The honest way to plan is to see the whole package at your real numbers, ruling and no ruling, side by side:
- Run your own numbers in the calculator →
- €100k in Amsterdam, with and without the ruling: the two sides of the cliff, line by line
- The Netherlands 30% ruling, explained: how the allowance works and the 2026 numbers
- Do you qualify for the 30% ruling? The 150km rule and the duration clock
- Is the 30% ruling actually worth it? Where it sits against Spain, Portugal, Sweden, and Italy
- NYC vs Amsterdam: the move that puts the ruling in play, whole package counted
FAQ
What happens to your pay when the 30% ruling ends?
Your gross stays the same, but the tax-free allowance disappears, so more of your salary is taxed and take-home falls the month the ruling expires. On €100,000 the drop is about €16,336 a year; on €150,000 about €24,093, by cityparity's Amsterdam engine.
How much does take-home drop after the 30% ruling in the Netherlands?
Roughly €1,361 a month on a €100,000 salary and €2,008 a month on €150,000 (income tax only, before living costs). The drop equals the value the ruling was adding, reversed.
Does your salary change when the 30% ruling expires?
No. Your employer keeps paying the same gross. What changes is the tax: without the allowance, your full salary sits in the Box 1 base, so your net pay steps down even though nothing on the contract moved.
When exactly does the 30% ruling end?
After a maximum of five years (60 months), reduced by any time you previously spent living or working in the Netherlands. It can end sooner than five years from your start date if you have Dutch history, so read the end date off your ruling decision.
Can you extend or renew the 30% ruling?
Not for the same period of residence. Once the five-year clock runs out the ruling is gone, and leaving and returning does not reset it the way people hope. Plan for the cliff rather than around it.
Is the 2027 rate cut the same as the expiry cliff?
No. From 2027 the rate drops from 30% to 27%, a smaller trim while the ruling is still running. The expiry cliff is the full drop when your five years end. They can stack: a later-stage holder feels the 27% dip first, then the full cliff.
Take-home figures come from cityparity's per-city engine (income tax, single filer, Amsterdam, before living costs) and are rounded. The cliff shown is the with-ruling take-home minus the same salary taxed with no allowance. Duration rules and the 2027 change are current at publication and depend on personal circumstances, so confirm with an advisor. See the methodology.