Tag Archives: Business & Economy

Last week, negotiations between Switzerland and the EU ended after failure to find agreement on key elements of a deal governing the relationship between Switzerland and the bloc. Over the weekend, Switzerland’s president Guy Parmelin defended the abrupt break in negotiations and sent a clear message to EU strategists in Brussels. Speaking to the newspaper NZZ am Sonntag Parmelin said that the EU would harm itself if it sank trade relations with one of its most important trading...

The total number of hours worked in Switzerland in 2020 dropped by nearly 4% compared to 2019, announced the Federal Statistical Office this week. © Thanasak Boonchoong | Dreamstime.comIn a year marked by the Covid-19 pandemic total hours worked in Switzerland dropped by nearly 300 million or 3.7% compared to the previous year. In 2019, 7.9 billion hours of work were clocked up in Switzerland. In 2020, this figure fell to 7.6 billion. Unsurprisingly, the biggest falls in hours...

Switzerland and the EU have been working at failing to agree on a new agreement on Switzerland’s relationship with the EU for sometime now. One point of negotiating leverage used by Switzerland is that Swiss voters would reject the deal proposed by the EU in a referendum. However, a recent poll suggests that might not be true. © Alexander Filon | Dreamstime.comA recent poll run by gfs.bern found that 64% of a sample of voters were either supportive (15%) or fairly supportive (49%) of the...

Recent data show that Swiss hotels and restaurants shed 40,000 jobs in 2020 as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, with restaurants reliant on business travel hit the hardest, according to RTS. © Jan Gajdosik | Dreamstime.comThese figures do not include the effects of the pandemic beyond the end of 2020 and therefore exclude the impact of the pandemic in 2021. Casimir Platzer, president of GastroSuisse, told newspapers in German-speaking Switzerland, that an additional 10,000 jobs...

Consumer sentiment among Swiss households is improving, according to Switzerland’s economic affairs office (SECO). © Rosaria De Marco | Dreamstime.comIn April 2021, the consumer sentiment index climbed back to -7 points after reaching a low of -40 in early 2020. The level of -7 is close to the pre-crisis level of early 2020 and close to its long term average of -5. The primary reason for the rise in consumer sentiment is a significant improvement in expectations regarding general...

Consumer sentiment among Swiss households is improving, according to Switzerland’s economic affairs office (SECO). © Rosaria De Marco | Dreamstime.comIn April 2021, the consumer sentiment index climbed back to -7 points after reaching a low of -40 in early 2020. The level of -7 is close to the pre-crisis level of early 2020 and close to its long term average of -5. The primary reason for the rise in consumer sentiment is a significant improvement in...

On 6 May 2021, SWISS announced a plan to cut jobs and the size of its fleet. © Boarding1now | Dreamstime.comDue to the continuing global coronavirus pandemic and structural changes in the market, the company expects a 20% structural decline in demand. In response, the airline plans to cut the fleet it had in 2019 by 15% and bring its personnel numbers down by 1,700 – before the pandemic SWISS employed 9,500 people. The company described the cuts as unavoidable. Much of this staff...

On 30 April 2021, Switzerland’s Federal Statistical Office released salary data for 2020 which showed a 1.5% rise in real salaries compared to 2019. © Suwat Supachavinswad | Dreamstime.comIn 2020, a 0.8% rise in nominal salaries was boosted by inflation of -0.7% bringing the total increase in the real average Swiss salary to 1.5%. The last time salaries rose this much was in 2015 when the real increase was 1.5%. In both 2015 and 2020 negative inflation of -1.1% and -0.7% significantly...

On 14 April 2021, Switzerland’s federal government announced it had spent CHF 14.2 billion more that it had collected in revenue in 2020. © Marekusz | Dreamstime.comThe loss represents the federal government’s consolidated excess expenditure for the year and is linked to the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to the statement. An additional CHF 16.8 billion was spent as a result of the pandemic. Consolidated accounts include the results of companies linked to the...

Around three years ago, the Swiss canton of Jura introduced a minimum wage of CHF 20 an hour (US$ 21.65). Now there is political pressure relook at the move, according to RTS. © Kasto80 | Dreamstime.comA group of cantonal parliamentarians from the PDC (CVP) is pushing for a review of the situation in response to pressure from some young people. The group says that the CHF 20 floor on hourly wages is having a negative effect on the employment prospects of some job seekers, particularly...