Switzerland

Joanna Kłosińska

• Swiss men like to wear tight shorts, white shirts, braces and William Tell caps, usually with feathers in. They spend most of their time up in the mountains, singing as they walk.

• They also enjoy yodelling and playing their 12m long Alpine horns. They are ruddy cheeked, fairly rich, and pretty smug because they have so much fresh mountain air and because their trains always run on time.

• They survive on a diet of chocolate and holey-cheese. The women are mostly blonde, never grow old, like to help milking the cattle and are usually called Heidi.

• They live in wooden huts on the mountainside, and each room has at least one cuckoo clock.

• All this is different if the individual happens to be from Zurich. Zurich dwellers are sharp-suited secretive bankers who make their living by hoarding Nazi gold and helping out corrupt politicians and gangsters. The whole country is spotlessly clean and they are obsessed with the environment.

Plan

• Geography• Politics• Demography• Culture• Economy• Business• Work

GEOGRAPHY

• Location

Switzerland lies in the center of Europe.

Has 41 285 km ².

• Topography

• Resources

Up to 60% of electricity produces a number of hydropower plants.

Nearly 35% of energy comes from nuclear power plants

POLITICS

• Federation democratic and parliamentary (no separation between the legislative, executive and judicial)

• Switzerland is a federal state, divided into cantons, having the nature of state-organisms.

• Head of state - The Swiss Federal CouncilEveline Widmer-Schlumpf

• Head of Government - President (Swiss Federal Council)

• Neutrality

• Red Cross

• Referendum

DEMOGRAPHY

• Switzerland's population is 7.32 million people.

• Age structure: the number of people aged:- Up to 14 years: 16.97% (634 030 boys, 601 929 girls)- 15 - 64 years: 67.73% (2.50545 million men, women, 2427408)- 65 and more: 15.3% (453 366 men, women, 661 091)

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MenWomen

rate of population growth: 0.27 %

Birth rate: 10.12/1000 inhabitants

Death rate: 8.77/1000 inhabitants

The average length of age that is expected of the newborn:

- Generally 79.73 years- Male 76.85 years

- Female 82.76 years

infant mortality rate: 4.48

deaths per 1,000 births

services 69,1 %

industry 26,3 %

agriculture 4,5 %

The number of employed persons in total: 3.9 million people

the structure of employment

Unemployment rate: 1.9%

• Languages:• There are four language areas: German, spoken by 74%

of the population, French - 20%, Italian - 4% and romansh - 1%.

• Imigration• The population of Switzerland is not only Swiss, but also

foreigners, whose number is very large: in 2001 there were 20.1% of the general public.

• Religion• According to the latest statistics of religious life in

Switzerland, both Christian religions such as Catholicism and Protestantism dominate the Swiss

CULTURE

• Science• In total, 113 Nobel Prize winners in all fields stand in

relation to Switzerland and the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded 9 times to organisations residing in Switzerland.

• A very important figure was the philosopher and psychologist Carl Gustav Jung. In Switzerland, lived and worked, but partly also in France, Germany and Italy, the German philosopher and classical philologist Friedrich Nietzsche.

• Swiss inventions

• Cuisine

ECONOMY

• The World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report currently ranks Switzerland's economy as the most competitive in the world,while ranked by the European Union as Europe's most innovative country

2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

GDP per one inhabitant (in CHF) 64 426 69 653 71,9 68 753 69 434

GDP (in billion CHF) 468,2 508,3 532,1nom.379 real.

535,3 546,2

GDP (growth in%) 3,2 3,1 1,9 -2,0 2,6

Budget deficit (% GDP) 2,5 0,9 1,1 0,8 0,2

Public debt (% GDP) 47,4 51,0 50,0 39,2 38,3

Inflation (in%) 1,1 0,7 0,2 -0,5 0,7

Unemployment (in%) 3,3 2,8 3,0 3,7 3,9

Exports (in billion CHF) 185,2 206,0 206,4 166,1 204,3

Imports (in billion CHF) 177,1 193,0 187,2 147,0 186,7

Foreign direct investment in the CH (CHF billion)

32,9 48,5 46,8 29,3 -

Swiss direct investment abroad (CHF billion).

87,6 61,2 56,4 36,2 -

BUSINESS

Important factors:

Highly qualified and dedicated workforce the availability of business services at world level (top banks,

financial institutions, insurance, consultancy and accounting office)

developed communication and industrial infrastructure Excellent communications with a high saturation of high speed

transmission networks pro - business attitude of the government and local government

institutions (relevant legislation) excellent research and development capabilities an exceptional level of technological know-how innovative technologies in high growth sectors such as

biotechnology, healthcare, telecommunications and information technology, microelectronics, environmental protection and services of high value-added

social security and social peace.

Pro Business government attitude is revealed:

• the establishment of low taxes on companies

• Europe's lowest social charges• Tax the lowest in Europe• low cost of obtaining capital• the repeal of taxes for up to 10 years• guaranteed loans• subsidizing the training of personnel• free movement of capital• the lack of restrictions on money

transfers and dividends.

WORK

• Jobs for:workers in the finance and insurance, IT, industry, construction and health care (nurses, doctors). Also, caregivers of the elderly, and willing to work in agriculture and tourism. In winter, lack of manpower in many ski resorts.

Earnings:There is no statutory minimum wage. Salaries range from 4 - 8 thousand. francs a month. In agriculture, you will earn about three thousand. francs, waiter salary is 3 - 5 thousand., and qualified professionals can count on at least 8 - 10 thousand. francs a month.

Cost of living:Renting a room costs 600 francs, and two-room apartment 820th Rents are highest in Zurich and Geneva. For the cheapest lunch in a restaurant you have to pay 20 francs.

• Work week in Switzerland is 5 days (Saturday and Sunday are days off from work - of course except for trade and services, which often operate on Saturdays until 14). Mostly work week in Switzerland is 41 hours per week (5 days), though legally permissible is 45 hours. For comparison, the work week in France is 35 hours, as in Germany.

It is assumed that the year comprises 261 days minus 105 working Saturdays and Sundays from 365 days, which generally gives the number of 2140.2 hours a year. If you subtract 4 weeks vacation, 9 public holidays and the average number of seven days of absence for other reasons of a personal nature is the average number of hours per year would be 1845. This puts Switzerland in third place in the world outside of Japan (2050) and USA (1904). In this comparison, Germany has nearly 200 hours per year less.

Thank you for the attention