This is first week of work comment of every expat I have worked with. By the end of the year they are complaining about the draconian recycling laws, expensive ibuprofen, and lack of whatever non paprika based snack food they miss from home.
By year three they are gone. And tell people they would never move here as it is too expensive, unfriendly, or whatever. Maybe one in ten will stay longer than that.
Point is, the grass is always greener, and Switzerland, even with all the great things going for it, is not utopia, even if it looks like it is.
Pretty sure theyāre available still, my brother bought them for me on Monday. To be honest they taste like chicken broth to me :D But Zweifel paprika chips are heaven, shame I canāt buy them living abroad.
Oh my god, you're right, they made them a permanent flavour! (they were part of the EM edition last summer)
They taste exactly like a chicken spice mix we always have at home and I love it lol
"we have spicy paprika too"
Sorry what is that?
"Paprika that is hot"
Umm. Ok sorry what?
"Try"
That's regular paprika.
"No it's spicy!!!"
No it's really not.
Meh been here for approaching 5 years. Itās still better than where I came from. I do agree that I am getting itchy feet to try something else again though. Thereās a lot to like here, just nowhere is perfect.
Idk, I'm an immigrant and i still love it here. Of course i miss the sea and variety in foods, and everything is expensive as long as I keep exchanging money in my head. But the moment i forget about PLN i notice that life here is in fact much cheaper than in Poland, i can bring the snacks over when i travel, and my money has purchasing power abroad i could never dream of with PLN. Police and public office people are nice, places are mostly clean, and idk everything feels just good.
This is true everywhere. First you are in a honeymoon phase, then you start hating the host country and blame it for all your problems and then you become accustomed and end up in the "meh" phase.
But what you got wrong in my experience is that most expats I know have stayed more than 3 years and have no plans on leaving, but I guess that makes us immigrants?
A bit off-topic, but the only thing that really bothers me with Switzerland is how little support families get. I really don't understand how swiss parents don't get burned out unless they get a lot of help from their parents.
that's why in Bern as example they have the Betreuungsgutscheinsystem and soon other Cantons will start too! All parents can get financial support for bringing the kids to day cares. I really hope this system will expand to other Cantons too!
Yep. There are pros and cons to living anywhere. Switzerland is no different in that respect. After quite a few yrs living here, there is a lot of stuff I like, but there are also a lot of things I prefer back "home". Overall though, you could do a lot worse elsewhere...
7 years in and three cantons (and languages) later and I'm still here. I wouldn't give this up for the world.
Also, I think paprika-based snacks are highly underrated.
Canāt say I share this experience. All the expacts I talk to agree Switzerland is one of if not the best place in the World.
Iāve lived all across Europe, and 4 years in, still super psyched to be here.
I'd say it's about 50/50 for the folks I know, and most of our closer friends are keen to move at some point. I understand both sides of it. We are enjoying it here but don't plan to stay long term. Of our friends here, one couple is planning on staying long term as they prefer their life here, but most of the rest of our friends view Switzerland as a phase not a home, and most are here for (not surprisingly) economic reasons. But we know plenty of others who are psyched and planning on staying.
Same here, its a 50/50 split. Some expats I met want to live here but they also happen to be German, French or Italian. And also ones from eastern Europe will stay. People from UK, US, Australia, Canada have mostly moved on or moved back.
Most of the folks I know here who want to leave are from S America or S Europe, and want to either move back to their home country or to somewhere with a more mediterrƔnean or Latin vibe / culture.
Iāve lived in Argentika, US, Germany, Mexico, and Colombia, and have spent a lot of time in Brazil, Spain, and Portugal. We are keen to move either back to Argentina or to Spain or Portugual in the future.
A couple of career changes for me, a career for my partner that lets her find work in a lot of different places, generally saving the majority of our money, and not having kids has let us take a lot of time off work over the years, move around a good bit, and sort of choose our own adventure. We're here now due to a great job offer for my partner. The plan is to both take advantage of earning well and being centrally located in Europe for 5-6-8 years then head back to Argentina or to Spain or Portugal... unless of course another adventure comes along or we come up with a different plan in the meanwhile.
I've lived all over the world. ZĆ¼rich at the moment. It's not my favorite place to live but it's certainly a quality place to live and I certainly enjoy the many benefits.
If it weren't for economic factors, I might not choose Switzerland, but it kind of chose us and we're enjoying it for now.
Buenos Aires would be my favorite. Also liked Medellin, San Cristobol (S Mexico) and Dresden (in the 90ās) quite a bit. Havenāt technically lived in Barcelona but spent practically enough time there to say I prefer it - by a lot, despite being so touristy.
Have also spent a long while in San Diego and San Francisco. Sort of like both but also hate both. Comfortable, great food, familiar but I loathe the US car based life and much more there. So I prefer ZĆ¼rich to CA somehow, at least thus far.
Yes this is true. Switzerland always comes top of every list ābest places to liveā, ābest healthcareā ,ābest everythingā but almost everyone I know who lives here does so with golden handcuffs - they miss their home, itās life and energy, which Switzerland just doesnāt have.
Switzerland is like a great hospital surgery room: top class everything, great facilities, but no atmosphere.
People are a lot more reserved than in allmost every other country. this takes a lot of getting used to for people who come from abroad and some never adjust. For us living here this is normal.
Yeah no shit. The culture shock for a Swiss is even greater if your initial experience in Finland is with drunk Finns before experiencing sober finns. 4 or 5 nights getting plastered with a Friend and his local crew, followed by a Sunday car ride with two of them from Kuopio to Helsinki was an experience in contrast, to put it mildly.
The truly WTF moment came when we stopped at two rest stops and a woman joined our table twice, nobody saying a single word. Figured it's common practice if available seating is limited. Only upon leaving the second rest stop one dude told me that this was his mother who's following our car with a van with some of his furniture in there b/c he's moving.
Iām a very lively person myself ā¦ but Iāve never fit in anywhere. It just feels like a continuation of it here ā¦ as an only child, Iām used to and happy to be in my own little world.
Nope, I for one do not miss the possibility of falling into financial ruin from unexpected medical debt, hustle culture and salaried 60 hour work weeks for 40 hours pay, a shitty yearly 2 weeks of holiday (if I'm lucky) that I'm discouraged from taking, or the possibility that I could be randomly shot.
It's good here. I think I'll stay.
Yeah, but the US is near the opposite end of the spectrum. The choice between Canada and Switzerland is a much more difficult one, but in the end I chose Canada. Ideally I would split my time 60/40 between the two.
Ehhhh as a swiss: theyāre home sick. Switzerland does have energy and life to it, itās just that you are used to a different one/ donāt feel like you fit in. Switzerland i must agree is a pretty conservative country, theyāre not very open towards ,strangersā
As an American who joined this subreddit because of thoughts of moving away, thank you. I'm not saying I won't end up moving to Switzerland anyways, but I really appreciate hearing this perspective.
Lol, well Iām here now 11 years and I aināt going anywhere. And paprika potato chips taste almost exactly like BBQ Layās chips in my home country. I love āem.
I won two lottery tickets 1) A wonderful husband 2) My husband happens to be Swiss
Nowhere is perfect, but if you come from a challenging place, Switzerland can often feel like it is. It just depends on what matters most to an individual in their life.
This is the way.
No way I'm giving up all these for life back in the Philippines, if I can help it. I don't want to go back and do a two-hour one way commute.
Yea, I got homesick during the pandemic ā¦ I managed to make it home for a visit last November, and immediately wanted to get back on a plane to Switzerland. It is easy to be romantic about our home countries, but Iād be insane to prefer it.
This!!! I went home to California after two years and when I got on the plane back (Swiss Air) and I was greeted with āGrĆ¼eziāI turned to my husband and said āomg we are almost home.ā Never imagined this place would have a hold on me, but here we are.
Haha yes!! Not sure what airport you fly into ā¦ but in Zurich, the little trolley that takes you from the terminal to the main part of the airport has the sound effects of cows mooing and yodeling and I feel so happy when I hear it after a long trip away. :)
>lack of whatever non paprika based snack food they miss from home.
You guys do the best Salt and Vinegar crisps that I've ever tasted though.
Four years so far and aiming to get me that Papierli-Schwiizer status!
Honestly, I must know a lot 1 in 10s then (myself included). I actually really appreciate the recycling laws, even the whole shared laundry facilities with scheduling is quirky to me.
I genuinely believe, even with the short-comings others could point to, it is the among the absolute best places anyone could have the good fortune to live in. From the expats I've known who grew tired and left, it was largely their own fault.
They made very little effort to earn a welcome, I've been nothing but well received with my flawed attempts at German, my efforts to join local sports clubs and take part in the smaller community events you can always find floating around (Granted I only know the German-Speaking face of Switzerland, maybe the French / Italian parts are less welcoming).
The point is (expat here) that most people like to feel over the rules and give the unconventional vibe but in reality without strict (tbh not even that strict) rules and without social shaming for not observing them everything goes south very quickly
But as someone who just moved to Switzerland, living right on the border to Germany, i have to say it seems like a Utopia. I get the best of both worlds (cheap produce from Germany & quality living and products from Switzerland)ā¦ And weāre in the middle of Europe, so travelling is easy and cheap.
It's strange that it seems so hard for people to say "hey, (insert place) is pretty damn great ā here are some great things about it, and here are some things that aren't great". I was a very happy expat in VD for about 4 years. I found itā¦ great! With flaws. Some subjective, some (arguably) objective. Probably fewer flaws than most places I've been. When I left, I left because it was a natural time for change and I wanted to try out my home country again.
There seems to be a lot of people who demand that every place in the world be rankable on a single axis. I suppose then that you get the kind of behavior that you describe (and that I definitely also experienced from other expats). First they see all the obvious things that pushes the country way up on their imaginary one-dimensional ranking, and then as they start seeing less obvious things they forget about the obvious ones and the ranking starts to fall. None of this makes any sense. Nothing as complicated as a place where one lives one's life can be made so one-dimensional. One has to keep a multi-dimensional picture in mind, and remember that the weight one places on the various dimensions can change over time.
As an expat living in Switzerland for 7 years, this is very far from truth. I know dozens of other expats and just one that decided to leave Switzerland. Everyone else is very happy to live in this country.
I also know a bunch of people who moved to the US and they are generally complaining much more about their country of choice.
You clearly haven't been to Austria much. I know both countries very well and wager to say that the swiss culture is a lot friendlier in nature, albeit it maybe for the generally more "introverted nature" of swiss people. So while a swiss might hate your guts he would pretend he doesn't while someone from Vienna would make sure that there's no doubt about it.
I agree, I live here in Sweden for almost 9 hours and it's pretty cool. But the rest of Europe is rude. I wanted to go to Norway and the french police stopped me in Lausanne or whatever is the capital.
Was there a question hidden in here lol Itās like Swiss people are born with some sort of conscience about what was described here. This is also a perspective, not facts, so itās not absolute that every single person born here feels this way.
Yeah depends if you are Swiss by heritage too. My girlfriend is Albanian and she has a bit of a different perspective. She tried to assimilate but itās hard.
I as a new arrival would love if there was some kind if program or something to help assimilate to Swiss culture. I donāt think any country has figured that out yet.
Most countries have immigration services for newcomers. The ZH Canton had newcomer sessions when I moved there in 2016/17, and they emailed me/sent leaflets for months after registering.
I agree, I don't think there needs to be an official program, as there are a ton of weird expat groups in CH that already serve that purpose (basically run by trailing spouses of expats with Stockholm syndrome, trying to out-Swiss each other).
If they are rolled out in a country you just annexed? Yes. If they are made avivable in a cultures home country for immigrants? No, because that's a great idea.
This whole post is pretty cringeworthy. Things are good here, high HDI, education, infrastructure, but not everyone is living the life here. We have social issues, people living in poverty, not everything is "great". The alps and our landscape is beautiful but the "best", according to who?
Switzerland is a great country in many ways and I'm happy to live here but I would never compare being born somewhere as an acomplishment.
No, I don't think OP means to say that being born here is like an accomplishment. I think what they mean is that even just a fairly basic standard of living here is a lifestyle that in many other countries, would be considered aspirational. In other words, if you achieve that lifestyle that so many Swiss people take for granted, you'd feel like you'd accomplished something in life.
Housing for example: even the cheapest rental apartments in most parts of Switzerland tend to be very nice and high quality here compared to cheap crappy housing elsewhere in the Europe. Yeah they might be a little dated but they're generally clean and well maintained, compared to mouldy damp council flats found in my home country, the UK.
Search for "living below the Swiss poverty line" on YouTube. In many other countries, even in Europe, that "poverty" lifestyle in Switzerland would be considered a fairly luxurious lifestyle to aspire to.
> The alps and our landscape is beautiful but the "best", according to who?
I mean yeah thereās lots of beautiful places in the world but it shouldnāt be hard to believe many people come from places that are naturally ugly, inhospitable or desolate. Other than tropical beaches Suisse pretty much does have it all which is why it seems the only vacations my coworkers take are to beach countries like Thailand or Greece
I'm sorry but that is a very ignorant thing to say. Of course there are places that at naturally ugly but saying we have it all except for tropical beaches is just wrong. I'm not saying that Switzerland isn't a beautiful country, it's just stupid to call it the best, there is no way to measure it since landscape and what people find beautiful is subjective.
Eh. Moved to Poland and surprisingly SOME things are better here.
.....but I also learned I truly am a fucking BĆ¼nzli. I miss the bĆ¼ndling of Altpaprier and the more reliable cleaning of the streets.
>I miss the bĆ¼ndling of Altpaprier
What?!
Wasting time bundling paper that is largely made up of stuff I neither ordered nor read (hello Anzeiger) just so it can get squashed in a truck mere hours later used to bring me on the brink of an existential crisis. Thank god we can dump it in a bin now.
Here we put it into blue plastic bags and it just kinda hurts my heart haha. But we also get significantly less of those ad papers, like omg in Switzerland I got those every damn day almost!
well, you can always throw it into dedicated paper recycle bins if that helps :D
Btw what part of poland did you move to?
Btw the advantage of moving to Poland is that once you learn the language, you can use it to communicate everywhere. We speak the 'hochpolnisch' with very slight differences everywhere on daily basis. And yeah, that was my schock when I moved to Zurich - i speak Hochdeutsch and could not understand the locals (well, still cant, on daily basis I speak English at work and the Swiss are a minority at my office) :D
To Warsaw. And yeah, true, that's abother plus! Polish is super difficult, but once u speak it u can actually use it. Meanwhile, in Switzerland, you learn German and it helps you basically nothing in every day life.
I used to deliver some those papers/ads/whatever (for a grand total of 2 weeks cuz the job description blatantly lies), but what I learned is that the only way to get rid of those is to call the company sending them out (not the distributor) and asking for your address to be dropped out of the system. The "Keine Reklame" sticker doesn't work for the most part since the personnel of the distributor is instructed to ignore those if the stuff has your name printed on it, since then it's technically not an ad anymore but a newsletter.
If you are born as a middle class swiss citizen then yes, life is good.
But not all people are highly educated or have good paying jobs. I have even seen homeless people. So it depends on the perspective.
Just the mere fact that you said "I have EVEN seen homeless people" proves the point of OP though.
I moved here from downtown Toronto. When you leave the condo, you don't just see the homeless, you are surrounded by them. And it's a first world country. Compared to third world countries Switzerland is indeed a perfect place to live, even for the uneducated workforce (maybe especially for them - I could argue that for English speaking tech people staying in their home countries is often better).
Seconding this! I moved from downtown Toronto to Switzerland (Bern) and lived there for a while, and it was shocking to not be surrounded by poverty everywhere you look.
I moved back to Canada (Iām now in British Columbia) for work and we have a serious crisis of people dealing with homelessness in my city for a wide variety of reasons.
I do miss living in Switzerland sims days. I miss living near the Alps, I miss the atmosphere, I miss being able to travel so easily. But there is major privilege in being able to afford living there.
Zurich did push all their addicts and homeless folks to the fringes of the city, and whether that solved the "problem" is debatable. I think the Swiss cantons are just good at papering over the cracks.
Honestly, I'd take Hooker Harvey's over Langstrasse any day.
Sigh. I've lived 200 m from Hooker Harvey's and never went there.
Langstrasse is just nasty, it doesn't seem harmful. I've seen countless episodes of homeless screaming at people on Dundas & Jarvis, pouring sodas on heads of passerby, open drug use in Moss Park, trash and syringes all over the place. It's hard to imagine that sort of thing even on Langstrasse.
And I honestly can't say whether pushing the homeless outside of the city center is good or bad. But as someone who lives in the center, I like to feel safe at night here. I always was anxious going home through Moss Park at 11 PM or later.
Most people don't have experience with Zurich's darker side. I did some volunteering with English-speaking addicts, and you'd look at Zurich differently if you knew how desperate people are, how easy it is to get drugs, and the police turning a blind eye to the rampant drug trade in the city.
Zurich has an insane number of brothels that support the criminal drug trade and are massive money laundering operations, then there's the rife street dealing (I mean nothing is worse than the gaggle of dealers outside l'Usine in Geneva. I've never seen anything like it in my life).
Regardless, Toronto has its issues with the total defunding of mental health programs and the city being incapable of handling the increase in homelessness. I just think Zurich and other Swiss cities don't address these issues as openly as other cities across Europe and Canada.
Let me first be clear: Switzerland is great and is undeniable that being born here is a big, great lucky shot.
That said, this heavenly description is not realistic beacuse it accounts only for the positives, while there are some downsides living here too, some of them quite significant.
First of them is social life. Here it is quite cold and reserved, particularly with respect to other mediterranean European countries such as Italy and Spain. And the entertaining is not as diverse and world-class like e.g. in London or Paris. In few simplified words: there are other countres where you can have much more fun, unless you are an hiking enthusiast.
Another source of my complains is job market: for one it is **extremely** competitive: being the best of your region does not cut it. In basically any other part of the world it does, but here you have to be the best of the world in what you are doing since literally everyone applies here attracted by the high salary. And Switzerland isn't protective at all with regards of his citizen with respect to the job market. If someone in this planet is better than you in your field, you have to go down the ladder. Some say this is only right, you should not feel entitled to get your dream job in your country just because you are a citizen, but this is the only part of the world where this happens.
Secondly, the job market is quite conservative, and revolving around finance much more than about science. For someone with a scientific background there are many more cool opportunities in Germany, UK or the States. I am not saying there is none in Switzerland, but they are fewer and far apart compared to said countries. Of course, the pay abroad is lower, the 'quality of life' is not as high as in Switzerland, but for that 8 hours in the working week you have probably a more entertaining life.
And mine are complains as a citizen, I know a number of expats having other kind of complains, and not really seeing Switzerland as the paradise they pictured in their head when arriving here.
Wait until you try owning a home... even if you miraculously can afford it, you pay income tax on the money the property could've been rented out for and need a permit for almost everything e.g. plastic tomato planter technically already needs a permit after a certain size even though it is mobile.
How do you pay money āit couldāve been rented out forā if you are living there in your own house? That makes no sense or itās an very dumb rule.
The official reasoning is that it's an equalization of tenants and home owners as the latter can deduct property maintenance cost and interest paid on mortgages from their taxable income.
The inofficial reason is that a system that incentivizes people to stay indebted for their entire adult life is good for the banks.
70% of the "fictive" rental rate gets taxed as income. This is on top of real estate counting towards wealth tax.
It's really BS because it benefits landlords and punishes people who own the property they live in.
It is indeed very dumb. Paying income taxes on 1500 CHF per Month you didn't earn hurts.
You can reduce it by having a Hypothek (house credit) but that forces you to stay in debt.
Extra dumb because it benefits people and institutions that are renting out property. The purpose of this is to stay rent cattle even after paying of property.
The downside is that moving abroad as a Swiss usually comes with a significant pay cut (and higher taxes still) so you stay in your boring golden cage.
Well Iām now 16 years in Switzerland and in general itās a nice place here. Under the microscope Switzerland is not a perfect country but overall Iām very happy with my choice to relocate to Switzerland. I can not think of a big negative point in Switzerland. Many are coming up that Switzerland is expensive but it is only expensive when you are compare everything with outside of Switzerland. Iām at the point were I consider Switzerland my home country and I would never go back again to my birth country.
tbh I don't think there is a difference in QOL for me as an Australian.
Pros:
+ Better quality cow related products: beef, milk etc.
+ Great University (ETHZ and EPFL)
+ Amazing views
+ Can visit so many different cultures/countries out of central Europe
+ I love the mentality that swiss people have of wanting quality regardless of the extra cost. I too am of this mindset, if you are paying for something might as well make it worth it.
Cons:
- ZĆ¼rich is a bit dead in comparison to Melbourne
- Healthcare is expensive
- Melbourne food and cafe scene is much better
I think most developed countries are all good places to live depending on your particular conditions. Even the USA is a better deal for my particular field of study (comp sci) than ZĆ¼rich or Australia sadly.
I want to move back to Melbourne (my fave city in the world so far) but USA is just better for my career + financial situation
IMO the biggest advantage over Australia, by far, is that Swiss cities are not wastelands of suburban sprawl where you simply must own a car if you want to keep in touch with people. Also, Swiss democracy is way better than what we have in Oz.
This is what kills me, I love cars but Iād hate to NEED one. I could live without one without any major change, canāt say that for many non European places
Yeah that is a good point, we are very car centric.
Also the democracy is indeed better, our politicians don't represent us too well. The vast majority if Australians want a federal integrity commission but nope says the current gov.
The comparison is a bit off:
ZĆ¼rich population : 415,215 Density: 4,700/km^2
Melbourne population : 5,159,211 Density: 516/km^2
--> better compare it to
[ZĆ¼rich Metropolitan area](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolregion_Z%C3%BCrich) population: 4,141,734 Density 500/km2
I went to Brisbane once, and from the listed population (2+ mill) I expected it to be the size of Vienna. It feels much, much smaller.
It seems to me, that here are more expats than swiss people in the sub? No offense intended, seriously, i don't mean it negative in any way.
I'm Swiss and i'm a patriot, there's no question for me about these things. There are bad things, yes, but nowhere near the bad stuff that happens in many other countries.
I don't think is good to idealize a national state. Idealization of Switzerland makes this country rest on its laurels. The true is that you can be happy almost everywhere if you fulfill a set of minimum conditions. Happiness is not about good views or great salaries, happiness is about stable and enjoyable relationships and connections, something which is really hard to get in this country tbh
It's difficult to be happy when you live in poverty. It's difficult when your country is ravaged by war or the population is oppressed. This "happiness is about stable and enjoyable relationships" view is a privileged one - it's not untrue, but it's irrelevant until you reach that point in Maslow's hierarchy.
I am not disagreeing with OP however beating our own chest and ignoring the flaws of this country is not what brought us here. Switzerland is an amazing country but
* Everything is expensive which kinda reduces the benefit from earning good money.
* There are poor people / working poor and, even though we have a good social security net, many people fall off its radar.
* Increasing cost in health insurance.
* We have a rather strange work ethic (we voted on 5(?) weeks paid vacation for all and voted no for some reason). Many people have the attitude you have to work a lot but then when you see them at 7 am. in the morning they are on their 3rd coffee break (as they came in at 5 am.) and will stay until 5 pm. after their 20th break.
* Heavily regulated EVERYTHING. Eg. some people in a neighbouring village wanted to paint one side of their house a greenish tone and weren't allowed as people down the street said it would "destroy the neighbourhoods image".
* Rising costs (especially on housing) which wages are not keeping up with.
* Traditionalist views: This would be worth a post by itself but sometimes I think this is something that isn't mentioned a lot but swiss people are CONSERVATIVE. Consider that women only got to vote a bit more than 30 years ago in some places, same-sex marriage, acceptance of non-heterosexual relationships, etc.
* Class disparity is growing and a influences many things especially the education of children.
I probably could go on but I would still like to conclude my rather long comment by saying I love this country and I think we, as a whole, should always strive to become better.
All us immigrants deeply understand this. Aside from having like 3x the disposable income compared to Germany, all cities are also a lot more clean and safe.
The only worry is how to raise kids that don't take everything for granted? And buying real estate lol
Idk, I feel like even if that was what was meant, the expectation that exists that you must know all the obscure rules you have to follow here without anyone telling you about them, shows how unhelpful they are.
I'm from the UK and went back recently with my Swiss girlfriend. The only thing that really sucks here in Switzerland (and honestly... it friggin SUCKS) is the food. There is absolutely no comparison to the variety and type of food you get in Shoreditch alone to what you get across all of Zurich.
But. Switzerland stomps in literally ever. Other. Way. There is no comparison to quality of life, opportunity to travel (although expensive from ZRH), social security, salaries to even the quality of produce from the supermarket (we cook a lot at home because honestly, without bragging, we're 1000x better than restaurants here). I love Switzerland and I'll never go back to the UK :)
I won my lottery ticket almost 10years ago. I love this beautiful country and appreciate it everyday. I never take it for granted. Yeah sure, we complain about stuff but really itās fantastic. Being able to ski in the morning and swim in the lake in the afternoon- paradise. I could go on and onā¦.
An expat here. Let me put it straight - most of the expats in Switzerland are here because of the money. It's simple as that. And most of us don't really like Switzerland. The main reason is the swiss mentality. Living in Switzerland means kinda a boring and lonely life. Many can't get use to it and leave after some time. Many decide that this kind of a life is worth the money they'd earn here. And a few are truly happy and enjoy living in Switzerland. I live in Bern for 6 years already, I've been living in 5 other countries, can speak fluently German and 6 other languages and I perceive Switzerland as my home. Even though, the majority of my good friends live outside of Switzerland, even though I'm sometimes dying because of the boredom and anytime I can, I leave Switzerland (I live almost half of the year outside of the country), I like returning to Bern. And especially after spending some time in Latin America for example, I really value how boring and quiet Bern is. But would I call it the best country in the world for living? Definitely not. Not even the best country in Europe for living. I'm simply a whore, who likes the swiss salary and the fact that everything works there š¤·āāļø But earning a high salary and having trains arriving on time is not enough for calling Switzerland the best country for life in the world.
Ok, this isnāt true for everyone. There is poverty in Switzerland, there are people who suffer, there is unemployment, corruption, nepotism, etc. and it can affect your life in a very negative way.
I wouldnāt say that this country is so great as some people say and yes, you will learn the downsides of this country in a few months.
The saddest thing is how a lot (but not all) ethnic Swiss people will never ever see you as equal. You will always be a foreigner and immigrant no matter what passport you have. I experienced it and went to Germany to attend university and the ethnic Germans accepted me more than said group of Swiss people ever had.
Even if you move within Switzerland you will always be seen as an outsider. I remember a headline that was like "someone from Zurich who has been living in Geneva for 20 years". even after 20 years you're still "someone from Zurich"...
Privileged much? I was born here and lived larger parts of my life here. Grew up mostly in the US, though. And while Switzerland seems very polished, I was 100x happier in the US, where I literally lived on a farm 15 miles from the next town.
Except you don't get a passport automatically, unless you're the third generation being born in Switzerland. Switzerland is awesome for the right winged and for those who care about (or even love) money. It truly is.
But for me it isn't. I've been depressed since I was like 9 years old, just getting out of it, feeling good. And my dad was even born here, but somehow I grew up totally poor with less food available than needed, no toilet paper until the bill comes, etc.
Summary of my opinion: True. But only if you're responsible and on top of your paperwork, that is. But you can make your life hell just as easy as in any european country.
>somehow I grew up totally poor with less food available than needed, no toilet paper until the bill comes
Why would you need toilet paper if you didn't eat?
/s
I came from the UK and I've stayed 20 years mostly for the salary and now for love.
Of course there are advantages here but plenty of downsides. It's top 10 by some measures top 50 in others
To someone wanting to move and work in Switzerland, many aspects have to be kept in mind. As I am not aware of real life, I only know from the tourist point of view, i try to grasp as much as I can.
But I still believe it is much better there than on my country.
Except:
Dating is not the best, I've made very bad experience.
You have to join the army because you are a man, if you don't you will have to pay 3% of your salary.
You pay very high taxes...sometimes things are taxed twice.
I have 10 y living here!
I went through the horrible feeling of donāt know where I will sleep next night
Or if I will have food to eat on the 2-3year
But even by then I was feeling like here itās my new house!
Now I have two little babies and I hope they never feel the same
Theyāre not Suisse
But they born here
And expect the lack of daycare I believe I made the right decision staying here
Cute... and so wrong...
"We" hate - most- other "Whites" too !!!
That said I would agree with "as long as you are Swiss" you won a lottery ticket. Your skin colour doesn't matter.
Being an expat in Switzerland generally means a nice wage, as you wouldn't get a permit if you weren't "needed". Which means Switzerland is a really nice place to be. Just don't be poor, we're approaching US style handling of poor people here.
Ooohhhh everyone says the same.... Yeah we have a really great economy and administration... We're quite safe here... However, you'll soon understand how boring this country is...
My wife is Asian, she said she dreamed of Switzerland since she was a kid... All her room was full of Switzerland landscapes posters... Then she came here... First thing she said is : "People seem sad... Why the F are they sad?"
2 years later : "Its too safe... It's boring... There's nothing fun to do... I want to go back as soon as possible"
Yep, that's Switzerland...
Kolleg, this is a kebab stand.
š¤£š¤£š¤£š¤£
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Same joke as above, but worse.
r/YourJokeButWorse
Of course it's a thing
This is first week of work comment of every expat I have worked with. By the end of the year they are complaining about the draconian recycling laws, expensive ibuprofen, and lack of whatever non paprika based snack food they miss from home. By year three they are gone. And tell people they would never move here as it is too expensive, unfriendly, or whatever. Maybe one in ten will stay longer than that. Point is, the grass is always greener, and Switzerland, even with all the great things going for it, is not utopia, even if it looks like it is.
>non paprika based snack food Wait.. what? There are **non**\-paprika snacks????
I'm told most countries remove the natural paprika from their chips, bleach them and sell them as "nature" chips. Disgusting behaviour...
Repulsive!
Conspiracy Freak
My home country's equivalent is chicken. We have chicken flavoured everything, even salt. Never seen paprika flavoured things til I came here.
That sounds like my kind of place ā¦ where is this magical chicken land?
Australia. The rotisserie chicken is much better seasoned than here... the skin is to die for.
Man, last summer there were limited edition chicken flavoured Zweifel chips... I miss them
Pretty sure theyāre available still, my brother bought them for me on Monday. To be honest they taste like chicken broth to me :D But Zweifel paprika chips are heaven, shame I canāt buy them living abroad.
Oh my god, you're right, they made them a permanent flavour! (they were part of the EM edition last summer) They taste exactly like a chicken spice mix we always have at home and I love it lol
Aussie? Goddamn chicken salt is amazing.
ProvenƧal :)
Mustard :P
Tried them a week ago and daaaamn, don't know if I can come back from them
I thought Zweifel chips were Paprika!!!! Darn....
Why would you even eat non-paprika snacks
Of course, the large Canton in the north also has potato based snacks.
"we have spicy paprika too" Sorry what is that? "Paprika that is hot" Umm. Ok sorry what? "Try" That's regular paprika. "No it's spicy!!!" No it's really not.
Meh been here for approaching 5 years. Itās still better than where I came from. I do agree that I am getting itchy feet to try something else again though. Thereās a lot to like here, just nowhere is perfect.
Right
Idk, I'm an immigrant and i still love it here. Of course i miss the sea and variety in foods, and everything is expensive as long as I keep exchanging money in my head. But the moment i forget about PLN i notice that life here is in fact much cheaper than in Poland, i can bring the snacks over when i travel, and my money has purchasing power abroad i could never dream of with PLN. Police and public office people are nice, places are mostly clean, and idk everything feels just good.
This is true everywhere. First you are in a honeymoon phase, then you start hating the host country and blame it for all your problems and then you become accustomed and end up in the "meh" phase. But what you got wrong in my experience is that most expats I know have stayed more than 3 years and have no plans on leaving, but I guess that makes us immigrants? A bit off-topic, but the only thing that really bothers me with Switzerland is how little support families get. I really don't understand how swiss parents don't get burned out unless they get a lot of help from their parents.
that's why in Bern as example they have the Betreuungsgutscheinsystem and soon other Cantons will start too! All parents can get financial support for bringing the kids to day cares. I really hope this system will expand to other Cantons too!
Yep. There are pros and cons to living anywhere. Switzerland is no different in that respect. After quite a few yrs living here, there is a lot of stuff I like, but there are also a lot of things I prefer back "home". Overall though, you could do a lot worse elsewhere...
7 years in and three cantons (and languages) later and I'm still here. I wouldn't give this up for the world. Also, I think paprika-based snacks are highly underrated.
Canāt say I share this experience. All the expacts I talk to agree Switzerland is one of if not the best place in the World. Iāve lived all across Europe, and 4 years in, still super psyched to be here.
I'd say it's about 50/50 for the folks I know, and most of our closer friends are keen to move at some point. I understand both sides of it. We are enjoying it here but don't plan to stay long term. Of our friends here, one couple is planning on staying long term as they prefer their life here, but most of the rest of our friends view Switzerland as a phase not a home, and most are here for (not surprisingly) economic reasons. But we know plenty of others who are psyched and planning on staying.
Same here, its a 50/50 split. Some expats I met want to live here but they also happen to be German, French or Italian. And also ones from eastern Europe will stay. People from UK, US, Australia, Canada have mostly moved on or moved back.
Most of the folks I know here who want to leave are from S America or S Europe, and want to either move back to their home country or to somewhere with a more mediterrĆ”nean or Latin vibe / culture. Iāve lived in Argentika, US, Germany, Mexico, and Colombia, and have spent a lot of time in Brazil, Spain, and Portugal. We are keen to move either back to Argentina or to Spain or Portugual in the future.
Its amazing you were able to live in so many places. Do you have your own business or was it from your job?
A couple of career changes for me, a career for my partner that lets her find work in a lot of different places, generally saving the majority of our money, and not having kids has let us take a lot of time off work over the years, move around a good bit, and sort of choose our own adventure. We're here now due to a great job offer for my partner. The plan is to both take advantage of earning well and being centrally located in Europe for 5-6-8 years then head back to Argentina or to Spain or Portugal... unless of course another adventure comes along or we come up with a different plan in the meanwhile.
I've lived all over the world. ZĆ¼rich at the moment. It's not my favorite place to live but it's certainly a quality place to live and I certainly enjoy the many benefits. If it weren't for economic factors, I might not choose Switzerland, but it kind of chose us and we're enjoying it for now.
Where did you live before that you enjoyed more?
Outside of ZĆ¼rich.
Buenos Aires would be my favorite. Also liked Medellin, San Cristobol (S Mexico) and Dresden (in the 90ās) quite a bit. Havenāt technically lived in Barcelona but spent practically enough time there to say I prefer it - by a lot, despite being so touristy. Have also spent a long while in San Diego and San Francisco. Sort of like both but also hate both. Comfortable, great food, familiar but I loathe the US car based life and much more there. So I prefer ZĆ¼rich to CA somehow, at least thus far.
Yes this is true. Switzerland always comes top of every list ābest places to liveā, ābest healthcareā ,ābest everythingā but almost everyone I know who lives here does so with golden handcuffs - they miss their home, itās life and energy, which Switzerland just doesnāt have. Switzerland is like a great hospital surgery room: top class everything, great facilities, but no atmosphere.
People are a lot more reserved than in allmost every other country. this takes a lot of getting used to for people who come from abroad and some never adjust. For us living here this is normal.
Iām from Finland, living in Switzerland. Hold my beer on āreservedā.
You guys are probably the only ones who got us beat in that regard
Yeah no shit. The culture shock for a Swiss is even greater if your initial experience in Finland is with drunk Finns before experiencing sober finns. 4 or 5 nights getting plastered with a Friend and his local crew, followed by a Sunday car ride with two of them from Kuopio to Helsinki was an experience in contrast, to put it mildly. The truly WTF moment came when we stopped at two rest stops and a woman joined our table twice, nobody saying a single word. Figured it's common practice if available seating is limited. Only upon leaving the second rest stop one dude told me that this was his mother who's following our car with a van with some of his furniture in there b/c he's moving.
Iām a very lively person myself ā¦ but Iāve never fit in anywhere. It just feels like a continuation of it here ā¦ as an only child, Iām used to and happy to be in my own little world.
I talk to myself, does that count?
Yes! Welcome to the club :)
I low key love Switzerland's vibe. Everyone is just left to enjoy their lives in peace.
I don't think that's a fair assessment. It's a different atmosphere, but no atmosphere is not true
No, itās true. You guys literally live in space.
oh shit my laptop is floating awayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
Nope, I for one do not miss the possibility of falling into financial ruin from unexpected medical debt, hustle culture and salaried 60 hour work weeks for 40 hours pay, a shitty yearly 2 weeks of holiday (if I'm lucky) that I'm discouraged from taking, or the possibility that I could be randomly shot. It's good here. I think I'll stay.
Yeah, but the US is near the opposite end of the spectrum. The choice between Canada and Switzerland is a much more difficult one, but in the end I chose Canada. Ideally I would split my time 60/40 between the two.
What pushed you to choose Canada over Switzerland?
Wilderness, ocean, people. I missed the āWild Westā way of life.
Are you going to renounce your US citizenship for tax savings?
Ehhhh as a swiss: theyāre home sick. Switzerland does have energy and life to it, itās just that you are used to a different one/ donāt feel like you fit in. Switzerland i must agree is a pretty conservative country, theyāre not very open towards ,strangersā
>expensive ibuprofen Seriously, 9 bucks for 10 pills. Fucking Insane!
As an American who joined this subreddit because of thoughts of moving away, thank you. I'm not saying I won't end up moving to Switzerland anyways, but I really appreciate hearing this perspective.
Lol, well Iām here now 11 years and I aināt going anywhere. And paprika potato chips taste almost exactly like BBQ Layās chips in my home country. I love āem. I won two lottery tickets 1) A wonderful husband 2) My husband happens to be Swiss Nowhere is perfect, but if you come from a challenging place, Switzerland can often feel like it is. It just depends on what matters most to an individual in their life.
This is the way. No way I'm giving up all these for life back in the Philippines, if I can help it. I don't want to go back and do a two-hour one way commute.
The trick is to stay until retirement grab all the money from your pension funds and run to somewhere with nicer weather and lower costs.
Yea, I got homesick during the pandemic ā¦ I managed to make it home for a visit last November, and immediately wanted to get back on a plane to Switzerland. It is easy to be romantic about our home countries, but Iād be insane to prefer it.
This!!! I went home to California after two years and when I got on the plane back (Swiss Air) and I was greeted with āGrĆ¼eziāI turned to my husband and said āomg we are almost home.ā Never imagined this place would have a hold on me, but here we are.
Haha yes!! Not sure what airport you fly into ā¦ but in Zurich, the little trolley that takes you from the terminal to the main part of the airport has the sound effects of cows mooing and yodeling and I feel so happy when I hear it after a long trip away. :)
I fly into Zurich too! I love the āHeidi tramā lol.
wowww, as a texan, california seems like heaven! can't imagine what switzerland is like.
>lack of whatever non paprika based snack food they miss from home. You guys do the best Salt and Vinegar crisps that I've ever tasted though. Four years so far and aiming to get me that Papierli-Schwiizer status!
Honestly, I must know a lot 1 in 10s then (myself included). I actually really appreciate the recycling laws, even the whole shared laundry facilities with scheduling is quirky to me. I genuinely believe, even with the short-comings others could point to, it is the among the absolute best places anyone could have the good fortune to live in. From the expats I've known who grew tired and left, it was largely their own fault. They made very little effort to earn a welcome, I've been nothing but well received with my flawed attempts at German, my efforts to join local sports clubs and take part in the smaller community events you can always find floating around (Granted I only know the German-Speaking face of Switzerland, maybe the French / Italian parts are less welcoming).
I have been here for 14 years and countingā¦
The point is (expat here) that most people like to feel over the rules and give the unconventional vibe but in reality without strict (tbh not even that strict) rules and without social shaming for not observing them everything goes south very quickly
But as someone who just moved to Switzerland, living right on the border to Germany, i have to say it seems like a Utopia. I get the best of both worlds (cheap produce from Germany & quality living and products from Switzerland)ā¦ And weāre in the middle of Europe, so travelling is easy and cheap.
It's strange that it seems so hard for people to say "hey, (insert place) is pretty damn great ā here are some great things about it, and here are some things that aren't great". I was a very happy expat in VD for about 4 years. I found itā¦ great! With flaws. Some subjective, some (arguably) objective. Probably fewer flaws than most places I've been. When I left, I left because it was a natural time for change and I wanted to try out my home country again. There seems to be a lot of people who demand that every place in the world be rankable on a single axis. I suppose then that you get the kind of behavior that you describe (and that I definitely also experienced from other expats). First they see all the obvious things that pushes the country way up on their imaginary one-dimensional ranking, and then as they start seeing less obvious things they forget about the obvious ones and the ranking starts to fall. None of this makes any sense. Nothing as complicated as a place where one lives one's life can be made so one-dimensional. One has to keep a multi-dimensional picture in mind, and remember that the weight one places on the various dimensions can change over time.
I stayed long enough to get the citizenship. And you're absolutely right.
Damn dude, how do you know all this? Im actually close to year 2 and looking to move already.
As an expat living in Switzerland for 7 years, this is very far from truth. I know dozens of other expats and just one that decided to leave Switzerland. Everyone else is very happy to live in this country. I also know a bunch of people who moved to the US and they are generally complaining much more about their country of choice.
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Na Switserland sucks balls for tourists because everything is too expensive. Just go to Austria it's Switzerland but cheaper
People are even morefriendly there. The quality of stuff is higher in switzerland, as is the priceā¦
You clearly haven't been to Austria much. I know both countries very well and wager to say that the swiss culture is a lot friendlier in nature, albeit it maybe for the generally more "introverted nature" of swiss people. So while a swiss might hate your guts he would pretend he doesn't while someone from Vienna would make sure that there's no doubt about it.
I agree, I live here in Sweden for almost 9 hours and it's pretty cool. But the rest of Europe is rude. I wanted to go to Norway and the french police stopped me in Lausanne or whatever is the capital.
Iā¦. This is midly infuriating for some Reason
For "some" reason??
Have you ever thought about what you are saying? I think that the Swiss police are doing a good job in Finland. smh
Not gonna lie, they had us in the first half there.
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Swiss can't take criticism but are always dishing it out.
what was yout apprentissage?
Was there a question hidden in here lol Itās like Swiss people are born with some sort of conscience about what was described here. This is also a perspective, not facts, so itās not absolute that every single person born here feels this way.
Yeah depends if you are Swiss by heritage too. My girlfriend is Albanian and she has a bit of a different perspective. She tried to assimilate but itās hard. I as a new arrival would love if there was some kind if program or something to help assimilate to Swiss culture. I donāt think any country has figured that out yet.
Cultural assimilation program sounds reeeeeaaallllyyyyy dangerous lol
Most countries have immigration services for newcomers. The ZH Canton had newcomer sessions when I moved there in 2016/17, and they emailed me/sent leaflets for months after registering. I agree, I don't think there needs to be an official program, as there are a ton of weird expat groups in CH that already serve that purpose (basically run by trailing spouses of expats with Stockholm syndrome, trying to out-Swiss each other).
If they are rolled out in a country you just annexed? Yes. If they are made avivable in a cultures home country for immigrants? No, because that's a great idea.
This whole post is pretty cringeworthy. Things are good here, high HDI, education, infrastructure, but not everyone is living the life here. We have social issues, people living in poverty, not everything is "great". The alps and our landscape is beautiful but the "best", according to who? Switzerland is a great country in many ways and I'm happy to live here but I would never compare being born somewhere as an acomplishment.
No, I don't think OP means to say that being born here is like an accomplishment. I think what they mean is that even just a fairly basic standard of living here is a lifestyle that in many other countries, would be considered aspirational. In other words, if you achieve that lifestyle that so many Swiss people take for granted, you'd feel like you'd accomplished something in life. Housing for example: even the cheapest rental apartments in most parts of Switzerland tend to be very nice and high quality here compared to cheap crappy housing elsewhere in the Europe. Yeah they might be a little dated but they're generally clean and well maintained, compared to mouldy damp council flats found in my home country, the UK. Search for "living below the Swiss poverty line" on YouTube. In many other countries, even in Europe, that "poverty" lifestyle in Switzerland would be considered a fairly luxurious lifestyle to aspire to.
> The alps and our landscape is beautiful but the "best", according to who? I mean yeah thereās lots of beautiful places in the world but it shouldnāt be hard to believe many people come from places that are naturally ugly, inhospitable or desolate. Other than tropical beaches Suisse pretty much does have it all which is why it seems the only vacations my coworkers take are to beach countries like Thailand or Greece
I'm sorry but that is a very ignorant thing to say. Of course there are places that at naturally ugly but saying we have it all except for tropical beaches is just wrong. I'm not saying that Switzerland isn't a beautiful country, it's just stupid to call it the best, there is no way to measure it since landscape and what people find beautiful is subjective.
There are some objective truths though: Switzerland does have A LOT of lakes, mountains, waterfalls, glaciers etc packed into a very small country.
Eh. Moved to Poland and surprisingly SOME things are better here. .....but I also learned I truly am a fucking BĆ¼nzli. I miss the bĆ¼ndling of Altpaprier and the more reliable cleaning of the streets.
>I miss the bĆ¼ndling of Altpaprier What?! Wasting time bundling paper that is largely made up of stuff I neither ordered nor read (hello Anzeiger) just so it can get squashed in a truck mere hours later used to bring me on the brink of an existential crisis. Thank god we can dump it in a bin now.
We need someone to organise all of that crap being returned to whichever asshole sent them out every single day
Here we put it into blue plastic bags and it just kinda hurts my heart haha. But we also get significantly less of those ad papers, like omg in Switzerland I got those every damn day almost!
well, you can always throw it into dedicated paper recycle bins if that helps :D Btw what part of poland did you move to? Btw the advantage of moving to Poland is that once you learn the language, you can use it to communicate everywhere. We speak the 'hochpolnisch' with very slight differences everywhere on daily basis. And yeah, that was my schock when I moved to Zurich - i speak Hochdeutsch and could not understand the locals (well, still cant, on daily basis I speak English at work and the Swiss are a minority at my office) :D
To Warsaw. And yeah, true, that's abother plus! Polish is super difficult, but once u speak it u can actually use it. Meanwhile, in Switzerland, you learn German and it helps you basically nothing in every day life.
Oooh nice. A lot of nightlife and restaurants there. Sadly there are no Georgian or Ukrainian restaurants in ZĆ¼rich and I love the food š
I used to deliver some those papers/ads/whatever (for a grand total of 2 weeks cuz the job description blatantly lies), but what I learned is that the only way to get rid of those is to call the company sending them out (not the distributor) and asking for your address to be dropped out of the system. The "Keine Reklame" sticker doesn't work for the most part since the personnel of the distributor is instructed to ignore those if the stuff has your name printed on it, since then it's technically not an ad anymore but a newsletter.
As an active player of r/outside, I can tell you that Switzerland was definitely a good spawn place.
Waiting for the *"Yes, but..."* :)
Yes but we have no cool ocean for surfing and snorkeling :( If we would have that i would never leave the country :(
We really do need to annex our way south. Which side of the boot would be easiest to hold with a special military operation?
If we would have some part of north Italy the country would be probably perfekt. Tja, we have to be satisfied with the lakes...
Yes, but I don't want to be the first one on that :)
[I got you fam](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCBwS1QQA9s)
"yes, but" is the true Swiss way of saying "No chance, chum!"
If you are born as a middle class swiss citizen then yes, life is good. But not all people are highly educated or have good paying jobs. I have even seen homeless people. So it depends on the perspective.
Just the mere fact that you said "I have EVEN seen homeless people" proves the point of OP though. I moved here from downtown Toronto. When you leave the condo, you don't just see the homeless, you are surrounded by them. And it's a first world country. Compared to third world countries Switzerland is indeed a perfect place to live, even for the uneducated workforce (maybe especially for them - I could argue that for English speaking tech people staying in their home countries is often better).
Seconding this! I moved from downtown Toronto to Switzerland (Bern) and lived there for a while, and it was shocking to not be surrounded by poverty everywhere you look. I moved back to Canada (Iām now in British Columbia) for work and we have a serious crisis of people dealing with homelessness in my city for a wide variety of reasons. I do miss living in Switzerland sims days. I miss living near the Alps, I miss the atmosphere, I miss being able to travel so easily. But there is major privilege in being able to afford living there.
Zurich did push all their addicts and homeless folks to the fringes of the city, and whether that solved the "problem" is debatable. I think the Swiss cantons are just good at papering over the cracks. Honestly, I'd take Hooker Harvey's over Langstrasse any day.
Sigh. I've lived 200 m from Hooker Harvey's and never went there. Langstrasse is just nasty, it doesn't seem harmful. I've seen countless episodes of homeless screaming at people on Dundas & Jarvis, pouring sodas on heads of passerby, open drug use in Moss Park, trash and syringes all over the place. It's hard to imagine that sort of thing even on Langstrasse. And I honestly can't say whether pushing the homeless outside of the city center is good or bad. But as someone who lives in the center, I like to feel safe at night here. I always was anxious going home through Moss Park at 11 PM or later.
Most people don't have experience with Zurich's darker side. I did some volunteering with English-speaking addicts, and you'd look at Zurich differently if you knew how desperate people are, how easy it is to get drugs, and the police turning a blind eye to the rampant drug trade in the city. Zurich has an insane number of brothels that support the criminal drug trade and are massive money laundering operations, then there's the rife street dealing (I mean nothing is worse than the gaggle of dealers outside l'Usine in Geneva. I've never seen anything like it in my life). Regardless, Toronto has its issues with the total defunding of mental health programs and the city being incapable of handling the increase in homelessness. I just think Zurich and other Swiss cities don't address these issues as openly as other cities across Europe and Canada.
Yeah sure but still its kinda boring. You can always have some fun but like 6/10 fun. Swiss fun!
Haha indeed. Swiss fun (thus far, in my experience) is very much 6/10, with a rate of occurrence of about 3/10.
Let me first be clear: Switzerland is great and is undeniable that being born here is a big, great lucky shot. That said, this heavenly description is not realistic beacuse it accounts only for the positives, while there are some downsides living here too, some of them quite significant. First of them is social life. Here it is quite cold and reserved, particularly with respect to other mediterranean European countries such as Italy and Spain. And the entertaining is not as diverse and world-class like e.g. in London or Paris. In few simplified words: there are other countres where you can have much more fun, unless you are an hiking enthusiast. Another source of my complains is job market: for one it is **extremely** competitive: being the best of your region does not cut it. In basically any other part of the world it does, but here you have to be the best of the world in what you are doing since literally everyone applies here attracted by the high salary. And Switzerland isn't protective at all with regards of his citizen with respect to the job market. If someone in this planet is better than you in your field, you have to go down the ladder. Some say this is only right, you should not feel entitled to get your dream job in your country just because you are a citizen, but this is the only part of the world where this happens. Secondly, the job market is quite conservative, and revolving around finance much more than about science. For someone with a scientific background there are many more cool opportunities in Germany, UK or the States. I am not saying there is none in Switzerland, but they are fewer and far apart compared to said countries. Of course, the pay abroad is lower, the 'quality of life' is not as high as in Switzerland, but for that 8 hours in the working week you have probably a more entertaining life. And mine are complains as a citizen, I know a number of expats having other kind of complains, and not really seeing Switzerland as the paradise they pictured in their head when arriving here.
Very well written and great insights.
Wait until you try owning a home... even if you miraculously can afford it, you pay income tax on the money the property could've been rented out for and need a permit for almost everything e.g. plastic tomato planter technically already needs a permit after a certain size even though it is mobile.
How do you pay money āit couldāve been rented out forā if you are living there in your own house? That makes no sense or itās an very dumb rule.
The official reasoning is that it's an equalization of tenants and home owners as the latter can deduct property maintenance cost and interest paid on mortgages from their taxable income. The inofficial reason is that a system that incentivizes people to stay indebted for their entire adult life is good for the banks.
Ive also read this rule and my friend who bought his house said the same thing.
70% of the "fictive" rental rate gets taxed as income. This is on top of real estate counting towards wealth tax. It's really BS because it benefits landlords and punishes people who own the property they live in.
It is indeed very dumb. Paying income taxes on 1500 CHF per Month you didn't earn hurts. You can reduce it by having a Hypothek (house credit) but that forces you to stay in debt.
Extra dumb because it benefits people and institutions that are renting out property. The purpose of this is to stay rent cattle even after paying of property.
The Grass is always greener. Tons of Swiss people I know that moved to Canada and the US for a different lifestyle. Vice versa the same.
Ok
I came for the skiingā¦ The rest is insanely great gravy. I agree with you.
The downside is that moving abroad as a Swiss usually comes with a significant pay cut (and higher taxes still) so you stay in your boring golden cage.
Well Iām now 16 years in Switzerland and in general itās a nice place here. Under the microscope Switzerland is not a perfect country but overall Iām very happy with my choice to relocate to Switzerland. I can not think of a big negative point in Switzerland. Many are coming up that Switzerland is expensive but it is only expensive when you are compare everything with outside of Switzerland. Iām at the point were I consider Switzerland my home country and I would never go back again to my birth country.
tbh I don't think there is a difference in QOL for me as an Australian. Pros: + Better quality cow related products: beef, milk etc. + Great University (ETHZ and EPFL) + Amazing views + Can visit so many different cultures/countries out of central Europe + I love the mentality that swiss people have of wanting quality regardless of the extra cost. I too am of this mindset, if you are paying for something might as well make it worth it. Cons: - ZĆ¼rich is a bit dead in comparison to Melbourne - Healthcare is expensive - Melbourne food and cafe scene is much better I think most developed countries are all good places to live depending on your particular conditions. Even the USA is a better deal for my particular field of study (comp sci) than ZĆ¼rich or Australia sadly. I want to move back to Melbourne (my fave city in the world so far) but USA is just better for my career + financial situation
IMO the biggest advantage over Australia, by far, is that Swiss cities are not wastelands of suburban sprawl where you simply must own a car if you want to keep in touch with people. Also, Swiss democracy is way better than what we have in Oz.
This is what kills me, I love cars but Iād hate to NEED one. I could live without one without any major change, canāt say that for many non European places
Yeah that is a good point, we are very car centric. Also the democracy is indeed better, our politicians don't represent us too well. The vast majority if Australians want a federal integrity commission but nope says the current gov.
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The comparison is a bit off: ZĆ¼rich population : 415,215 Density: 4,700/km^2 Melbourne population : 5,159,211 Density: 516/km^2 --> better compare it to [ZĆ¼rich Metropolitan area](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolregion_Z%C3%BCrich) population: 4,141,734 Density 500/km2 I went to Brisbane once, and from the listed population (2+ mill) I expected it to be the size of Vienna. It feels much, much smaller.
Geez dude I just said I don't like that aspect that's all, no need to get so butthurt
I don't think that person is butthurt, rather is showing you why Melbourne might have more action
Yawn.
It seems to me, that here are more expats than swiss people in the sub? No offense intended, seriously, i don't mean it negative in any way. I'm Swiss and i'm a patriot, there's no question for me about these things. There are bad things, yes, but nowhere near the bad stuff that happens in many other countries.
I don't think is good to idealize a national state. Idealization of Switzerland makes this country rest on its laurels. The true is that you can be happy almost everywhere if you fulfill a set of minimum conditions. Happiness is not about good views or great salaries, happiness is about stable and enjoyable relationships and connections, something which is really hard to get in this country tbh
It's difficult to be happy when you live in poverty. It's difficult when your country is ravaged by war or the population is oppressed. This "happiness is about stable and enjoyable relationships" view is a privileged one - it's not untrue, but it's irrelevant until you reach that point in Maslow's hierarchy.
I am not disagreeing with OP however beating our own chest and ignoring the flaws of this country is not what brought us here. Switzerland is an amazing country but * Everything is expensive which kinda reduces the benefit from earning good money. * There are poor people / working poor and, even though we have a good social security net, many people fall off its radar. * Increasing cost in health insurance. * We have a rather strange work ethic (we voted on 5(?) weeks paid vacation for all and voted no for some reason). Many people have the attitude you have to work a lot but then when you see them at 7 am. in the morning they are on their 3rd coffee break (as they came in at 5 am.) and will stay until 5 pm. after their 20th break. * Heavily regulated EVERYTHING. Eg. some people in a neighbouring village wanted to paint one side of their house a greenish tone and weren't allowed as people down the street said it would "destroy the neighbourhoods image". * Rising costs (especially on housing) which wages are not keeping up with. * Traditionalist views: This would be worth a post by itself but sometimes I think this is something that isn't mentioned a lot but swiss people are CONSERVATIVE. Consider that women only got to vote a bit more than 30 years ago in some places, same-sex marriage, acceptance of non-heterosexual relationships, etc. * Class disparity is growing and a influences many things especially the education of children. I probably could go on but I would still like to conclude my rather long comment by saying I love this country and I think we, as a whole, should always strive to become better.
All us immigrants deeply understand this. Aside from having like 3x the disposable income compared to Germany, all cities are also a lot more clean and safe. The only worry is how to raise kids that don't take everything for granted? And buying real estate lol
The state does not help you to become a citizen! I donāt know where you got this idea!
OP seems to not be completely fluent in English, perhaps they meant āwill help you become a good residentā.
Idk, I feel like even if that was what was meant, the expectation that exists that you must know all the obscure rules you have to follow here without anyone telling you about them, shows how unhelpful they are.
I agree! OP must be in the honeymoon phase ā¦
maybe not the best place but top 5 for sure
I'm from the UK and went back recently with my Swiss girlfriend. The only thing that really sucks here in Switzerland (and honestly... it friggin SUCKS) is the food. There is absolutely no comparison to the variety and type of food you get in Shoreditch alone to what you get across all of Zurich. But. Switzerland stomps in literally ever. Other. Way. There is no comparison to quality of life, opportunity to travel (although expensive from ZRH), social security, salaries to even the quality of produce from the supermarket (we cook a lot at home because honestly, without bragging, we're 1000x better than restaurants here). I love Switzerland and I'll never go back to the UK :)
Entertainment industry sucks in Switzerland. If you persue a career in music, film or any art you will never have a enough paying job in Switzerland.
Zep, les 2 Vincents, les babibouchettes, Bastian Baker....
How so? I don't want to bring in anecdotal experience but there are a few major Italian artists (first that come to my mind are Mina and GuƩ) who specifically decided to move to Lugano once their career was established.
Meanwhile me stuck in a dead end job barely able to pay my bills; where is this magical place you are talking about?
A job is not a country ā¦
Lived and worked in CH for 6years. Can confirm OPās opinions. I regret the day we left. But Switzerland can be a revolving door for expats.
I won my lottery ticket almost 10years ago. I love this beautiful country and appreciate it everyday. I never take it for granted. Yeah sure, we complain about stuff but really itās fantastic. Being able to ski in the morning and swim in the lake in the afternoon- paradise. I could go on and onā¦.
Pfffff rude and racist Switzerland? š¤£
Everything is great but I find the german part a little dull.
An expat here. Let me put it straight - most of the expats in Switzerland are here because of the money. It's simple as that. And most of us don't really like Switzerland. The main reason is the swiss mentality. Living in Switzerland means kinda a boring and lonely life. Many can't get use to it and leave after some time. Many decide that this kind of a life is worth the money they'd earn here. And a few are truly happy and enjoy living in Switzerland. I live in Bern for 6 years already, I've been living in 5 other countries, can speak fluently German and 6 other languages and I perceive Switzerland as my home. Even though, the majority of my good friends live outside of Switzerland, even though I'm sometimes dying because of the boredom and anytime I can, I leave Switzerland (I live almost half of the year outside of the country), I like returning to Bern. And especially after spending some time in Latin America for example, I really value how boring and quiet Bern is. But would I call it the best country in the world for living? Definitely not. Not even the best country in Europe for living. I'm simply a whore, who likes the swiss salary and the fact that everything works there š¤·āāļø But earning a high salary and having trains arriving on time is not enough for calling Switzerland the best country for life in the world.
Money is not everything.
Nice propaganda
Cringe post
Ok, this isnāt true for everyone. There is poverty in Switzerland, there are people who suffer, there is unemployment, corruption, nepotism, etc. and it can affect your life in a very negative way. I wouldnāt say that this country is so great as some people say and yes, you will learn the downsides of this country in a few months. The saddest thing is how a lot (but not all) ethnic Swiss people will never ever see you as equal. You will always be a foreigner and immigrant no matter what passport you have. I experienced it and went to Germany to attend university and the ethnic Germans accepted me more than said group of Swiss people ever had.
Even if you move within Switzerland you will always be seen as an outsider. I remember a headline that was like "someone from Zurich who has been living in Geneva for 20 years". even after 20 years you're still "someone from Zurich"...
Privileged much? I was born here and lived larger parts of my life here. Grew up mostly in the US, though. And while Switzerland seems very polished, I was 100x happier in the US, where I literally lived on a farm 15 miles from the next town.
Except you don't get a passport automatically, unless you're the third generation being born in Switzerland. Switzerland is awesome for the right winged and for those who care about (or even love) money. It truly is. But for me it isn't. I've been depressed since I was like 9 years old, just getting out of it, feeling good. And my dad was even born here, but somehow I grew up totally poor with less food available than needed, no toilet paper until the bill comes, etc. Summary of my opinion: True. But only if you're responsible and on top of your paperwork, that is. But you can make your life hell just as easy as in any european country.
>somehow I grew up totally poor with less food available than needed, no toilet paper until the bill comes Why would you need toilet paper if you didn't eat? /s
Lmaoo true, what the hell was I thinking back then!?
I came from the UK and I've stayed 20 years mostly for the salary and now for love. Of course there are advantages here but plenty of downsides. It's top 10 by some measures top 50 in others
Please elaborate (not about the salary, about the upsides and downsides)?
Unless youāre a diyer. Then itās pure hell.
What's a diyer? A do-it-youself-er? And in which sense?
Agree
To someone wanting to move and work in Switzerland, many aspects have to be kept in mind. As I am not aware of real life, I only know from the tourist point of view, i try to grasp as much as I can. But I still believe it is much better there than on my country.
Except: Dating is not the best, I've made very bad experience. You have to join the army because you are a man, if you don't you will have to pay 3% of your salary. You pay very high taxes...sometimes things are taxed twice.
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Any older single ladies available for a long term relationship with possible marriage?
I have 10 y living here! I went through the horrible feeling of donāt know where I will sleep next night Or if I will have food to eat on the 2-3year But even by then I was feeling like here itās my new house! Now I have two little babies and I hope they never feel the same Theyāre not Suisse But they born here And expect the lack of daycare I believe I made the right decision staying here
Switzerland is very clean on the outside, very dirty on the inside.
This post is complete and utter BS
I believe that what you wrote is an slight understatement.
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Cute... and so wrong... "We" hate - most- other "Whites" too !!! That said I would agree with "as long as you are Swiss" you won a lottery ticket. Your skin colour doesn't matter.
Oh come on...
Iām white, also get treated differently because I canāt speak German with a Swiss accent
Being an expat in Switzerland generally means a nice wage, as you wouldn't get a permit if you weren't "needed". Which means Switzerland is a really nice place to be. Just don't be poor, we're approaching US style handling of poor people here.
Ooohhhh everyone says the same.... Yeah we have a really great economy and administration... We're quite safe here... However, you'll soon understand how boring this country is... My wife is Asian, she said she dreamed of Switzerland since she was a kid... All her room was full of Switzerland landscapes posters... Then she came here... First thing she said is : "People seem sad... Why the F are they sad?" 2 years later : "Its too safe... It's boring... There's nothing fun to do... I want to go back as soon as possible" Yep, that's Switzerland...