91–100 of 186 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is also a fair amount of xenophobia inherent in the Swiss national identity. I know Germans who have lived there for 10+ years and are still considered outsiders.
Can you name a place that doesn't have that? I've lived in three different (Western) countries and felt the same thing in all of them.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is also a fair amount of xenophobia inherent in the Swiss national identity. I know Germans who have lived there for 10+ years and are still considered outsiders.
Can you name a place that doesn't have that? I've lived in three different (Western) countries and felt the same thing in all of them.
In my opinion this is missing an important thing: Does the Swiss model scale? For example, the Singapore model can't scale. It's based on rich people and corporations arbitraging the international fiscal system. You can't have another Singapore without having another East Asia and West with it. Swiss is definitively a privileged place that is benefiting from the overall wealth of Europe and many other countries. We c…
But if the export markets were as rich as Switzerland, they would buy even more luxury watches. So I don't see how your point makes sense. The Swiss model does seem to scale. The population has scaled from 6.2 million in 1970 to about 8.2 million today. GDP per capita also went up significantly during this time, and outpaced GDP per capita growth in the USA. You can find a lot of people who write off the Swiss exampl…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is also a fair amount of xenophobia inherent in the Swiss national identity. I know Germans who have lived there for 10+ years and are still considered outsiders.
Can you name a place that doesn't have that? I've lived in three different (Western) countries and felt the same thing in all of them.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the complaint here (if I understand you correctly) is that you are giving a vacation day and then making a certain day mandatory to use it. This practice is common among companies and extremely infuriating and in my opinion should be illegal. Better to have 35 days paid and make december 22nd a company holiday.
It's not that uncommon to include "company holidays" in "paid days off". Denmark has that as well, I get 5 weeks of vacation, and 5 days of vacation/days-off. My employer is free to "spend" the 5 days for me.
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Before anyone thinks Switzerland is some bastion of democracy, I'd like to point out that they've been very conservative in some areas. Women didn't have federal voting rights until 1971, and received nation-wide local voting rights fairly recently in 1991. [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women's_suffrage_in_Switzerlan...
There is also a fair amount of xenophobia inherent in the Swiss national identity. I know Germans who have lived there for 10+ years and are still considered outsiders.
There's definitely other forms of xenophobia here, though. There are a lot of negative stereotypes about some of the refugees that have come to Switzerland over the years, and many Swiss I talk to dislike the idea of refugees coming to Switzerland and choosing not to work (being unable to work is a different story).
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Can you explain? Why higher taxes? Can't it be a mixture of private enterprises replacing some equivalent public institutions from the Swiss setup? Even non-profits if you can reach critical mass on tithes, cf effective altruism. Seems doable if you have good rhetoric and get a movement going.
Doesn't it come down to the argument about whether a private company can run a service (on behalf of society) more efficiently than the government itself? The article makes this pretty clear - $3,000 for giving birth in a Swiss hospital plus much better care, or $30,000 for bare minimum care in the US. I very much doubt it costs more to run hospitals in the US - even with the liberal lawsuit culture. It's more likely…
The Swiss system is somewhat fixed prices (TarMED etc) for care provided. This changes every so often. However, hospitals and doctors do charge for extras not related to primary care e.g. private hospital room, choice of Dr and hospitals.
Secondly, insurers are not allowed to dispute charges by doctors for primary care (things covered under LaMAL). In the US medical staff spends a lot of time talking to insurers before starting treatment about payment, this practically does not happen here. A doctor prescribes or does, the insurer pays no discussion (or very, very rarely). Insurers thus compete by getting the best customers and extra's for those with money, as well as reducing their own costs.
Also every one is insured, you can choose your own insurer if you don't one is picked at random for you. Every year you can change insurance (cancel in November to change in new year). For tourists or the first 3 months that you live here the state covers.
Each Kanton/State has at least one public hospital, if you don't have extra insurance this is where you will be treated. To a good standard just nothing experimental. These hospitals are very focussed on their costs. i.e. they will schedule similar operations on the same day. As a patient you will get whatever dr is assigned to the operation. If you have expensive insurance you can ask for a specialist. This costs extra!
Of course there are many private hospitals in CH, however they compete for the rich patients who can pay for the luxury. These hospitals actively move care to the public ones when they can get away with it.
Slightly off topic, but the beauty of Switzerland was such a stark contrast to where I grew up in New Jersey that it almost made me angry. All these people, going about their daily lives in Switzerland seemingly oblivious to the fairy-tale landscape around them!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is also a fair amount of xenophobia inherent in the Swiss national identity. I know Germans who have lived there for 10+ years and are still considered outsiders.
In my experience, all you have to do is (passably) speak swiss german to be accepted by the locals. A lot of Germans live here 10+ years without speaking swiss german and I notice some distaste from the Swiss since a Swiss guy will feel like it's rude if he doesn't speak high german with a German, and many really don't like speaking high german. There's definitely other forms of xenophobia here, though. There are a l…
I'm sorry, but who actually likes that idea?
In my opinion this is missing an important thing: Does the Swiss model scale? For example, the Singapore model can't scale. It's based on rich people and corporations arbitraging the international fiscal system. You can't have another Singapore without having another East Asia and West with it. Swiss is definitively a privileged place that is benefiting from the overall wealth of Europe and many other countries. We c…
There's no reason why it can't scale, but one problem in implementing this kind of system is convincing the population to accept higher taxes (and Swiss taxes are, overall, still significantly higher than the US despite what the article seems to make out). It is, ultimately a case of the government taking more of your personal wealth to provide services to society as a whole, which flies in stark contrast to the trad…