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Switzerland is great, but should we be using it as an example for other countries to follow? Most other countries can't expect a substantial portion of their ta

Switzerland is great, but should we be using it as an example for other countries to follow? Most other countries can't expect a substantial portion of their tax base to come from banks holding trillions of dollars of dictators' assets, physical commodity trading, and multinational pharma conglomerates (not to mention the impact on the local economy of the spending of the very well-paid employees of said institutions). I'm not trying to hate on Switzerland by saying this....my grandfather emigrated from there, I have many cousins still there, it's an amazing place, virtually everyone is super healthy and multilingual, they have forward-thinking socially liberal laws, etc.....but let's call a spade a spade when it comes to how they are able to afford everything.

s3nnyy 10y ago
Banking is less than 5% of Switzerland's GDP (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banking_in_Switzerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banking_in_Switzerland). The top 10 companies by revenue are all in pharmaceuticals or commodity trading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Swiss_companies_by_revenue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Swiss_companies_by_rev.... Chocolate, cheese and mountains is just there to entertain tourists but even if you would kill tourism and banking, Switzerland still would be superstrong due to the megacorps (e.g., Glencore is located here and trades with 80% of all coal in the world) who decided to pay taxes in Switzerland. (You can read more about Switzerland in my blogpost "8 reasons why I moved to Switzerland to work in tech": https://medium.com/@iwaninzurich/eight-reasons-why-i-moved-to-switzerland-to-work-in-it-c7ac18af4f90# https://medium.com/@iwaninzurich/eight-reasons-why-i-moved-t... - I am well-connected tech-recruiter in Zurich and if you're thinking of moving here and getting a coding job, feel free to contact me - you find my email address in my HN profile.)

s3nnyy 10y ago

Banking is less than 5% of Switzerland's GDP (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banking_in_Switzerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banking_in_Switzerland). The top 10 companies by revenue are all in pharmaceuticals or commodity trading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Swiss_companies_by_revenue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Swiss_companies_by_rev.... Chocolate, cheese and mountains is just there to entertain tourists but even if you would kill tourism and banking, Switzerland still would be superstrong due to the megacorps (e.g., Glencore is located here and trades with 80% of all coal in the world) who decided to pay taxes in Switzerland. (You can read more about Switzerland in my blogpost "8 reasons why I moved to Switzerland to work in tech": https://medium.com/@iwaninzurich/eight-reasons-why-i-moved-to-switzerland-to-work-in-it-c7ac18af4f90# https://medium.com/@iwaninzurich/eight-reasons-why-i-moved-t... - I am well-connected tech-recruiter in Zurich and if you're thinking of moving here and getting a coding job, feel free to contact me - you find my email address in my HN profile.)