In 1997, more than 65% of the nominal value added within the Dutch economy was accounted for by the services sector. In 1950, it had still been less than 50%. The shares of the agricultural sector and manufacturing industry have shrunk accordingly. Within the services sector, the greatest expansions are accounted for by business services, banking and telecommunications.
The problem is that it is not easy to determine the output volume of services, which can usually only be calculated in a roundabout way. Because the growth of output is underestimated, price movements in the services sector are systematically overestimated because of these measurement problems.