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Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

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Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#211

Post by mseebach »

lordnacho wrote: post #200
im4w1l wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I remember meeting a guy who had a degree as a food chemist. I asked him what jobs he was after, and he said ... food chemist. Could someone explain this to me? Like I assume lordnacho had expected that guy to apply for a wider category of jobs, but which jobs? And what is the advantage of that broadness?

Say you have a degree in maths. What jobs could you apply for? Just "Mathematician"? I think you could do a whole range of things. Anything from quantitative trading to traffic management. Or something that doesn't even require math, like project management. The advantage of broadness is you have a wider choice about what you do. If one kind of work turns out not to appeal to you, you aren't stuck. That has some econ…

I suppose the example is poor, then. Food chemist are pretty much trained to do a rather narrow range of jobs, pretty much all called something with "food chemist". A mathematician (and most other academic degrees[1]) isn't really trained to do any particular job at all (except research, I suppose), so they need to cast a wide net. A better example might be a "Java Programmer" not even considering looking at job postings in the .NET section?

1: Plenty of vocational training takes place at universities and have degree-titles attached to them. That doesn't make them academic pursuits. I say this as a polytech-rebranded-as-"university"-trained engineer and I firmly believe that I shouldn't hold a degree that implies that I have an academic education.

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#212

Post by brusch64 »

Kurtz79 wrote: post #209
brusch64 wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say that the food is expensive in Switzerland because they want to strengthen their farmers and national food industry. Switzerland is topographically not really great for farming (high mountains, no big flat areas, not enough warmth), so they have some disadvantages there. All countries surrounding Switzerland are part of the EU, so there are cheap farming products in the shops. I am living on the border to…

Interesting, I always assumed there would be no protection laws as it has free trade agreements with the EU, but there are actually exceptions (from Wikipedia). "The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) is a regional trade organisation and free trade area consisting of four European states: Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland.[1] The organisation operates in parallel with the European Union (EU), and al…

The differences are really staggering. Comparing the prices of 1kg of minced meat

Austria 5€

Switzerland 9.5 CHF (8.73€)

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#213

Post by Rasco »

luispedrocoelho wrote: post #167
clock_tower wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain is really hard to reconcile with the fact that many of us would love to live in the latter countries and couldn't be paid to move to Mississippi. Remember good GDP versus bad GDP; a traffic jam increases GDP, but isn't anything particularly worth buying. Accumulated capital (like Notre Dame and the Louvre) doesn't show up in GDP either, an…

"Accumulated capital (like Notre Dame and the Louvre) doesn't show up in GDP either, and if anything tends to lower it." Notre Dame and the Louvre are a couple of the things that make Paris the single biggest tourist destination in the world, from which it derives a huge amount of GDP. The French tourist officials make sure to monetize the Louvre for all they can. * "Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that…

"The French tourist officials make sure to monetize the Louvre for all they can."

The access to the Louvre (permanent collection) is free for :

everyone under 18 years old whatever the nationality,

every resident of the European Economic Area (31 countries) under 25 years old,

everyone under 26 years old whatever the nationality the Friday from 6 p.m. to 9:45 p.m.,

everyone the first sunday of each month between october and march and on july 14th,

other specific groups of people,

And it is 15€ for everyone else for a day. Not what I would call particularly excessive.

http://www.louvre.fr/en/hours-admission/admission

The Louvre still relies mainly on public subvention (102 M€ in 2015) tickets bring ~65M€, private subventions ~12M€. But yes it surely brings people and has a good impact on the local economy.

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#214

Post by languagewars »

shin_lao wrote: post #207
ccozan wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last time I tried to get a gig in Switzerland as a freelancer, they told me there is no such thing as a freelancer there, every one must be hired. State mandates that. However, the tax is so low, that is doesn't really matter. On the other side, the cost of living is so high (Zuerich area) so that it really worth it if you plan to _move_ there for the rest of your live.

Last time I tried to get a gig in Switzerland as a freelancer, they told me there is no such thing as a freelancer there, every one must be hired. That's absolutely wrong, you've been lied to. Which part of Switzerland was it?

I think they meant that there isn't really a freelancer visa, so most people would have a chicken and egg problem. AFAIK you can run your own business with a B permit which is in turn justified by income/employment in that business, but you would usually transition from a permit through another employer or other types of visas (family, student, etc.) I think waiting until you had a C permit would be more common, especially if your only connection with Switzerland is employment.

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#215

Post by misja111 »

zavandor wrote: post #210
misja111 wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm amazed by this 40% which you and zavandor are paying. I'm living in Zurich as well and I'm not paying even half of that (and no I'm not working as a cashier). If I'm looking at the tax rates of the canton Zurich then the maximum you can be charged for, cantonal and federal taxes combined, is 26.2%: http://taxsummaries.pwc.com/uk/taxsummaries/wwts.nsf/ID/Swit...

You forgot municipal tax, which is 119% of cantonal in Zürich. 40% tax rate that I was talking is marginal tax rate, i.e. from a certain and fairly low point the state will pocket 400 Fr in taxes out of every additional 1000 Fr of your income. And then there's 5.1% AHV and other social things on top...

Let's take somebody with an annual income of 200,000 CHF, a well above average income. According to https://en.comparis.ch/steuern/steuervergleich/steuern-im-ve..., the total federal, cantonal and municipal taxes together would be 51,410 CHF per annum, about 25%.

That is a lot below any other European country. Maybe you included VAT to come up with your 40% marginal tax rate? But then you should count VAT for other countries as well when you are comparing them. And apart from that, the VAT in Switzerland is also very low.

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#216

Post by ccozan »

shin_lao wrote: post #207
ccozan wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last time I tried to get a gig in Switzerland as a freelancer, they told me there is no such thing as a freelancer there, every one must be hired. State mandates that. However, the tax is so low, that is doesn't really matter. On the other side, the cost of living is so high (Zuerich area) so that it really worth it if you plan to _move_ there for the rest of your live.

Last time I tried to get a gig in Switzerland as a freelancer, they told me there is no such thing as a freelancer there, every one must be hired. That's absolutely wrong, you've been lied to. Which part of Switzerland was it?

That was Zuerich.

They told me, there is no such thing a service contract between an individual and a company. I must be either hired or I need to have my own company.

I am not inventing this, simply repeating what the companies said, and they really meant it.

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#217

Post by ccozan »

languagewars wrote: post #214
shin_lao wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last time I tried to get a gig in Switzerland as a freelancer, they told me there is no such thing as a freelancer there, every one must be hired. That's absolutely wrong, you've been lied to. Which part of Switzerland was it?

I think they meant that there isn't really a freelancer visa, so most people would have a chicken and egg problem. AFAIK you can run your own business with a B permit which is in turn justified by income/employment in that business, but you would usually transition from a permit through another employer or other types of visas (family, student, etc.) I think waiting until you had a C permit would be more common, espe…

I wouldn't need a visa as a German ( or any other EU national ). If I want to work ( as employed ), I would need an "Aufenthaltsbewilligung".

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#218

Post by luispedrocoelho »

Rasco wrote: post #213
luispedrocoelho wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Accumulated capital (like Notre Dame and the Louvre) doesn't show up in GDP either, and if anything tends to lower it." Notre Dame and the Louvre are a couple of the things that make Paris the single biggest tourist destination in the world, from which it derives a huge amount of GDP. The French tourist officials make sure to monetize the Louvre for all they can. * "Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that…

"The French tourist officials make sure to monetize the Louvre for all they can." The access to the Louvre (permanent collection) is free for : everyone under 18 years old whatever the nationality, every resident of the European Economic Area (31 countries) under 25 years old, everyone under 26 years old whatever the nationality the Friday from 6 p.m. to 9:45 p.m., everyone the first sunday of each month between octo…

The benefits to French GDP are not mainly from the tickets, but from the tourism-related revenue (hotel stays, restaurants, flights, &c).

The official Paris tourist office has a picture of the Louvre on the top of its front page.

Let me put it this way: if I say that google monetizes its search engine as much as it can, I don't mean it charges you to search.

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#219

Post by luispedrocoelho »

omegaham wrote: post #155
grecy wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain And that's why GDP per capita is so useless. You have a few multi billionaires running your country, and you have tens of millions of people in abject poverty, tens of millions with no health insurance, etc. Don't look at GDP per capita, it tells you noting about life for the average person.

How about median household income? Mississippi's median household income is $36,919. This compares to the UK's median household income of $31,617. Note, of course, that this doesn't count social benefits. The UK's household income is lower, but they also get the NHS, better unemployment insurance, and so on.

These are gross income values (pre-tax), so, actually they do count social benefits (at least partially, the median household may be the beneficiary of transfers).

Re: Switzerland is the world’s most competitive economy

#220

Post by zavandor »

misja111 wrote: post #215
zavandor wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You forgot municipal tax, which is 119% of cantonal in Zürich. 40% tax rate that I was talking is marginal tax rate, i.e. from a certain and fairly low point the state will pocket 400 Fr in taxes out of every additional 1000 Fr of your income. And then there's 5.1% AHV and other social things on top...

Let's take somebody with an annual income of 200,000 CHF, a well above average income. According to https://en.comparis.ch/steuern/steuervergleich/steuern-im-ve... , the total federal, cantonal and municipal taxes together would be 51,410 CHF per annum, about 25%. That is a lot below any other European country. Maybe you included VAT to come up with your 40% marginal tax rate? But then you should count VAT for other…

When that somebody earns 10k more, he'll pay 3948 CHF of taxes on those 10k => 39.48% marginal tax rate.
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