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> personal income tax of 40% means you work for the government 40% of the year In Switzerland government directly spends about 32.0% of GDP. That is well below

> personal income tax of 40% means you work for the government 40% of the year In Switzerland government directly spends about 32.0% of GDP. That is well below OECD avg. In how we got there. Basically the government was naturally pretty conservative in spending terms for a long term. In the 90s all of a sudden debt shot up, going from 10% of GDP to 30% of GDP in 10 years (that federal only, its more if you take all the rest). This was something that wasn't popular, and we voted on it. https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/va/20011202/index.html https://www.bk.admin.ch/ch/d/pore/va/20011202/index.html 84.7% of people voted to adopt the "debt break". Since then debt as % of GDP has been going down or remained flat. We did take on extra debt for Covid, but this by law has to be paid back by 2035.

laurencerowe 1y ago
Much of this is a result of the way health insurance and spending is classified, with only 35% paid for by government in Switzerland rather than 80% in most other EU countries and 55% in the US. Adjust for that and government spending would be around 39%, still low for a rich European country, but not so far off of somewhere like the Netherlands or UK (about 44%).
- panick21_ 1y ago
  Sure, but there are private aspects to the system and if we are going to list everything that is strongly regulated by the government you likely get to a higher number. The Dutch, as far as I know, but not sure, also have some kind of private insurance system, so might get hard to compare.
  - laurencerowe 1y ago
    Healthcare is such a large part of national expenditure that I think it is worth adjusting for it when comparing government expenditure shares of GDP. It is around 12% in Switzerland. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.CHEX.GD.ZS?locations=CH-NL-DE-GB https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.CHEX.GD.ZS?locat... Many countries organise healthcare largely through non-government health insurers, but those still get counted as part of government expenditure in both Netherlands (69%) and Germany (80%), not much less than the UK's (83%) with a National Health Service. Switzerland on 35% is a huge outlier here. In terms of administration the Swiss system seems not completely dissimilar to the German system in that coverage is mandatory and there are a range of non-profit providers to choose between. But the Swiss scheme is classified as private expenditure because its mandatory payments are made directly with income based subsidies rather than equivalent amounts being paid through the tax system. That one simple accounting change lowers the government share of GDP by 5.4%. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.GHED.CH.ZS?locations=CH-NL-GB-DE https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.GHED.CH.ZS?locat...

laurencerowe 1y ago

Much of this is a result of the way health insurance and spending is classified, with only 35% paid for by government in Switzerland rather than 80% in most other EU countries and 55% in the US. Adjust for that and government spending would be around 39%, still low for a rich European country, but not so far off of somewhere like the Netherlands or UK (about 44%).

panick21_ 1y ago
Sure, but there are private aspects to the system and if we are going to list everything that is strongly regulated by the government you likely get to a higher number. The Dutch, as far as I know, but not sure, also have some kind of private insurance system, so might get hard to compare.
- laurencerowe 1y ago
  Healthcare is such a large part of national expenditure that I think it is worth adjusting for it when comparing government expenditure shares of GDP. It is around 12% in Switzerland. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.CHEX.GD.ZS?locations=CH-NL-DE-GB https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.CHEX.GD.ZS?locat... Many countries organise healthcare largely through non-government health insurers, but those still get counted as part of government expenditure in both Netherlands (69%) and Germany (80%), not much less than the UK's (83%) with a National Health Service. Switzerland on 35% is a huge outlier here. In terms of administration the Swiss system seems not completely dissimilar to the German system in that coverage is mandatory and there are a range of non-profit providers to choose between. But the Swiss scheme is classified as private expenditure because its mandatory payments are made directly with income based subsidies rather than equivalent amounts being paid through the tax system. That one simple accounting change lowers the government share of GDP by 5.4%. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.GHED.CH.ZS?locations=CH-NL-GB-DE https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.XPD.GHED.CH.ZS?locat...