Tag Archives: Personal finance

Switzerland’s gender pay gap narrowed again in 2024. Women earned 15.7% less than men on average, down from 16.2% in 2022, according to the Federal Statistical Office (FSO). The unexplained difference narrowed to 6.5%. Photo by Sarah Chai on Pexels.com The trend is longstanding. Across the economy, including both the private and public sectors, the gap stood at 19.0% in 2018 and 18.0% in 2020. The figures are based on gross monthly wages standardised to a full-time workload. Part...

Switzerland’s housing market varies significantly by region. The chances of owning a home depend heavily on the canton in which one lives. Photo by angga samba on Pexels.com Switzerland’s home-ownership rate is low by European standards, but the national figure hides a much more interesting story. In 2024, 35.7% of permanently occupied homes were owner-occupied. Yet the gap between cantons was enormous. In Appenzell Innerrhoden, 55.8% of homes were occupied by their owners. In...

Switzerland’s economy grew by 1.6% in real terms in 2025, compared with 1.5% in 2024. The broadly steady pace of expansion was driven mainly by strong domestic demand, which rose by 2.5%. Investment was particularly buoyant, increasing by 3.5%, reported the Federal Statistical Office (FSO). Swiss francs The 2025 figure is slightly below Switzerland’s recent long-run norm. Annual real GDP growth from 2005 to 2024, Switzerland grew by about 2.0% a year on average. The period includes the...

Employment in Switzerland continued to rise in the second quarter of 2026, according to the Federal Statistical Office. Most of the new jobs were in services, while the number of vacancies was also higher than a year earlier. Photo by RDNE Stock project on Pexels.com At the end of June, companies outside agriculture employed 5.698m people. Of these, 2.388m worked part-time. Women accounted for 68.2% of part-time workers. On a full-time-equivalent basis, employment amounted to 4.435m...

With inflation running at just 0.4%, the battle over wages in 2027 may be as much about productivity growth as lost purchasing power. In any case Switzerland’s wage negotiations for 2027 are shaping up to be contentious. Photo by Sergey Sergeev on Pexels.com Travail.Suisse, a trade-union federation, is demanding an across-the-board pay rise of 2%. The Swiss Employers’ Association, by contrast, reckons an average increase of around 1% would be more realistic. The unions’ demand is...

Consumer prices declined in July, underscoring how different Switzerland’s inflation story is from much of the world. Over the month the consumer-price index fell by 0.1% from June, leaving prices just 0.4% higher than a year earlier, according to the Federal Statistical Office (FSO). Core inflation, which strips out fresh and seasonal products, energy and fuel, was even weaker, at 0.3% year on year. Photo by Ian Gabaraev on Pexels.com The monthly decline owed much to cheaper travel,...

A report by Switzerland’s Federal Audit Office (SFAO) showing that most discounts on medicines are not passed on to insured patients, as required by law, has prompted an angry response from parliamentarians. Speaking to RTS on Thursday, Baptiste Hurni, a Socialist Party MP, described the practice as organised theft. Photo by https://kaboompics.com/ on Pexels.com According to the SFAO report, published on Wednesday, pharmacists, hospitals and doctors’ surgeries retain part of the...

Switzerland’s residential battery market is growing fast. Around half of new photovoltaic installations are now paired with storage, according to Swissolar. Falling battery prices, lower payments for surplus solar power and the prospect of more flexible electricity tariffs are all helping to drive demand. But popularity should not be confused with profitability. In Switzerland, solar power already supplies about 14% of electricity demand. That creates a new problem: what to do with...

Swiss public-transport fares will rise by an average of 3.6% in December 2026, less than the 3.9% increase originally planned. The reduction follows negotiations between the industry and Switzerland’s price regulator. @ Alliance SwissPass The price of a second-class GA travelcard, which provides unlimited travel on much of the Swiss public-transport network, will rise by CHF 100 to CHF 4,095. Alliance SwissPass, the industry body, had initially proposed an increase of CHF 200. A...

The number of people receiving vocational-rehabilitation support through Switzerland’s disability-insurance system rose again in 2025. Mental illness remained the leading cause of disability, especially among young people. Photo by Ruslan Rozanov on Pexels.com Some 61,000 people received vocational-rehabilitation support, the Federal Social Insurance Office (FSIO) said on Monday. That was 3,300 more than in 2024 and more than three times as many as in 2008. Spending on these...