Land of opportunity
June 20, 2011
The flow of people migrating from Germany to Switzerland has risen steadily ever since Swiss voters decided to open their borders to the European Union under the Schengen Agreement in a 2005 referendum.
In 2005, just over 18,000 Germans headed south to Switzerland. In 2008 it was more than 35,000 and latest statistics from last August indicate that 2010 is likely to set a new record.
To put all that in perspective, those figures are similar to the number of Germans who chose to move to the United States – a country 40 times bigger than Switzerland.
Motives and prospects
When asked why they moved to Switzerland, German workers interviewed by Deutsche Welle gave a variety of responses, ranging from a lack of opportunities at home to simply the hand of fate.
"Unemployment," answered Kati Schuster, a laboratory technician from the German state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. "And the lack of any possible worthwhile and permanent employment in the foreseeable future."
Kasia Contardo, another laboratory technician who studied nutritional technology in Berlin, said she moved to Switzerland for a temporary traineeship at a pharmaceutical company and stayed put.
"At first I was only thinking of staying in Switzerland for six months," she explained. "When a permanent position was offered to me after my traineeship (I took it) and am today still here in Switzerland."
Money matters
Others mentioned that financial incentives also played a role in their decisions to live in Switzerland.
"Taxes and other payroll deductions are significantly less (here in Switzerland)," said Michael Schaub, a Bavarian who says he moved to Zurich for no particular reason when he was 21 years old.
"The pay before taxes is not so different from the pay in Germany before taxes, but the real difference is in the after-tax pay,” he said, adding that the benefit is offset somewhat by the fact that Swiss consumer prices are considerably higher than in Germany
All the respondents said they travelled across the border to shop in German stores, where the recent appreciation of the Swiss franc has further increased their purchasing power.
Talking tensions
So what do Swiss locals think about the influx of German workers? Many Swiss respondents had mixed feelings.
Some said they felt it had simply become "in" for Germans to emigrate and that many moved to Switzerland simply because other Germans they know are doing it.
"It has become a movement," one Swiss bank worker said. "Germans like the Swiss life style, and enjoy it that they can speak in their own mother language here.”
The standard German language or hochdeutsch most German emigrants speak while working in Switzerland is, however, quite different from the Swiss German and regional dialects locals normally use among themselves. This has led to some resentment.
"I'm offended when I have to speak standard German to someone from Germany so that he or she can understand me, while he or she then responds effortlessly and even laughs at my accent," one Swiss laboratory worker said.
"It seems that the Swiss must adapt to the foreigners and not the other way around," said David Contardo, a 32-year-old Swiss typesetter from Zurich. "It won't be astonishing if at some time in the future the 'true Swiss culture' can no longer be found."
Companies profit
Swiss companies, however, are generally positive in their view of German migrants.
The media relations department of Swiss insurer Swisslife said German job applicants tended to be well-qualified and educated in fields not available in Switzerland, for example in certain specialist IT branches.
Swisslife statistics showed that the number of Germans working for the company increased by around 12 percent from 2007 to 2009, while the total number of foreigners working at the firm rose roughly 1 percent each year since 2007.
Patrizia Bocher, from the human resources department of the Swiss branch of HSBC Private Bank, said that about 10 percent of the bank's 320 Zurich-based employees came from Germany. She explained that private banking is a very front-loaded, customer-centric business. Managers therefore try to pair customers with advisers from the same country.
In general, all the Swiss companies surveyed said the Schengen Agreement had increased the size of the market for qualified workers. They stressed that nationality plays a minor or non-existent role in personnel decisions and that hiring is based on who has the best qualifications.
Given that net salaries in cities like Zurich are very competitive compared with pay levels in Germany, it's only natural that more German candidates have been applying for jobs in Switzerland, they said.
Author: Gary Levinson
Editor: Sam Edmonds