Tag Archives: Politics

Yesterday, Switzerland’s National Council, or parliament, voted 95 to 94, with 3 abstentions, to introduce quotas for the management and boards of quoted companies. © Lovelyday12 | Dreamstime.com Boards will be required to have 30% women and management teams 20%. The rules could affect 250 companies. At the same time the quotas will not come with sanctions. Companies would have to explain why the quotas had not been met and set out plans to meet them in the future. Speaking to RTS, Simonetta...

PostBus, the nation’s postal bus service, receives government aid based on its financial performance. © Artzzz _ Dreamstime.com With around 2,200 bright yellow buses operating on around 900 routes, it forms an important part of Switzerland’s transport network and employs around 4,000 people. However, not long after the private PostBus company was created in 2006, it started manipulating its accounts. An independent investigation calculated that unjustified state subsidies paid to it from 2007...

Switzerland’s government is working hard to find ways to fix a looming state pension shortfall. © Sang Lei | Dreamstime.com - Click to enlarge Two politicians in the canton of Fribourg have decided to seek savings by attempting to cut lifetime government pensions granted after short stints in the job, according to the newspaper 20 Minutes. In some Swiss cantons, government leaders can work for several years and leave...

Italian asset markets continue to fare better than many expected. The political uncertainty following the March election has been followed by confidence that the Five Star Movement and the (Northern) League will be able to put together a government in the coming days. If so, Italy would have taken half the time Germany did to cobble a government together after inconclusive elections. Politics makes for...

© Andrea De Martin | Dreamstime.com By January 2018, the number receiving disability welfare in Switzerland had dropped to 217,200, 40,300 fewer than in 2006 when the number reached a record 257,500. Switzerland’s Federal Social Insurance Office (FSIO) attributes the reduction to an occupational rehabilitation programme started in 2008, and disability welfare fraud investigations. In 2017, 40,800 disability...

Switzerland’s government is working hard to find ways to fix a looming state pension shortfall. © Sang Lei | Dreamstime.com Two politicians in the canton of Fribourg have decided to seek savings by attempting to cut lifetime government pensions granted after short stints in the job, according to the newspaper 20 Minutes. In some Swiss cantons, government leaders can work for several years and leave with pensions for life, a perk that Nicolas Kolly (UDC/SVP) and Romain Collaud (PLR/FDP) think...

In collaboration with the Swiss union Unia, Switzerland’s Young Socialists have launched a protest against the exploitation of interns. © Loganban | Dreamstime.com - Click to enlarge To get on the career ladder, many young people feel compelled to take internships offering little or no pay. The Young Socialists are demanding interns be better paid. Recent data from the Federal Statistical Office shows that 23% of...

By January 2018, the number receiving disability welfare in Switzerland had dropped to 217,200, 40,300 fewer than in 2006 when the number reached a record 257,500. © Andrea De Martin | Dreamstime.com Switzerland’s Federal Social Insurance Office (FSIO) attributes the reduction to an occupational rehabilitation programme started in 2008, and disability welfare fraud investigations. In 2017, 40,800 disability beneficiaries were eligible for the occupational rehabilitation programme, designed to...

The survey found that the pay gap between the highest and lowest earners decreased only very slightly in the years between 2008 and 2016, A government survey analysing wage structures in the Alpine nation found that the median salary for a full-time job in 2016 was CHF6,502 ($6,509) for the entire Swiss economy. The bottom 10% of Swiss earners had a salary of less than CHF4,313 ($4,317), while the best paid 10% earned...

Switzerland is obliged to forward tax information that might interest partner states. For the first time, Switzerland’s Federal Tax Administration (FTA) has sent details on advance tax rulings to its partners in the spontaneous exchange of information deal. The FTA announced on Tuesdayexternal link that it had transmitted a first batch of 82 reports to a total of 41 states, including Britain, France, Germany, the...