Switzerland rejects imposing higher minimum wages

The Swiss referendum today rejected by a large majority the establishment of the world’s highest minimum wage of 4,000 francs (3,270 euros) or 22 francs an hour (18 euros), according to public voting projections provided by television Switzerland.

77% of voters voted against the proposal sponsored by unions and supported by the Socialist Party and Green and was intended as a way to counter the growing wage inequality in one of the most expensive countries in the world.

Currently, a worker at minimum wage in Switzerland takes about twice a Brit. Despite this, the Swiss authorities estimate that about 1 in 10 workers is struggling to pay the rent of their house even if they work full time because of the high cost of living in the country. The average hourly wage is 33 Swiss francs (27 euros).

Wage differentials have occupied a prominent space in the public debate in recent months, with the initiative of young socialists to limit the pay of executives, which was rejected last November. The text proposed that no manager get paid 12 times more than any other employee in the company. Still, today’s result has shown that the Swiss are reluctant to allow the state to regulate how much a worker should earn and impose those rules on small and medium enterprises, which generate two of every three jobs in Switzerland.

Short URL: https://www.newspakistan.pk/?p=44177

Posted by Khalil Khan on May 19 2014. Filed under Europe. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.