Switzerland’s biggest party has decided that the country only has room for 10 million people — just as businesses struggle to fill vacancies.
The controversy over immigration and population growth is framing the country’s elections next month. Yet, about 40 percent of businesses say they have difficulties hiring more staff, according to a survey by the KOF economic research center, up from a long-term average of below 10 percent.
This stands in stark contrast with the flagship proposal of the Swiss People’s Party (SVP), which holds more than one-quarter of seats in the lower house: a constitutional amendment that seeks to prevent the resident population from surpassing 10 million before 2050, from today’s 8.9 million.
Photo: Reuters
The party proposes to curb population growth if that threshold nears, by limiting immigration, especially from asylum seekers. KOF says the 10 million threshold would be crossed around 2035.
With elections set for Oct. 22, the campaign is resonating with voters. One in three Swiss say immigration is a key concern, according to a recent poll, and SVP is set to further increase its share.
Foreigners already make up one-quarter of Switzerland’s population, yet even a 26 percent jump in new arrivals last year was not enough to satisfy labor demand.
Asylum seekers only make up 6 percent of new arrivals, and, at 2.1 percent, unemployment remains near a record low.
“Lack of workers is the most relevant new issue for firms, and will likely stay with us for years to come,” said Jan-Egbert Sturm, who heads the KOF center at ETH Zurich university.
Switzerland’s high-wage labor market regularly taps the surrounding EU for workers. A treaty in force since 2002 allows citizens from the bloc to freely come for work — subject to some exceptions.
The government’s success in luring multinationals such as Alphabet Inc’s Google has helped propel home prices in Zurich past the levels of London and Paris. The left-wing Social Democratic Party wants to cut subsidies for international companies.
KOF estimates that, without immigration, Switzerland’s working age population would shrink by about 13 percent in the next 20 years, while the number of older people would increase, putting stress on the social security system.
“The Swiss labor market grows strongly above its demographic potential,” said Boris Zuercher, labor head at the State Secratariat for Economic Affairs within the economy ministry.
The country “has to make sure it stays attractive,” Zuercher added.
Malaysia yesterday installed a motorcycle-riding billionaire sultan as its new king in lavish ceremonies for a post seen as a ballast in times of political crises. The coronation ceremony for Malaysia’s King Sultan Ibrahim, 65, at the National Palace in Kuala Lumpur followed his oath-taking in January as the country’s 17th monarch. Malaysia is a constitutional monarchy, with a unique arrangement that sees the throne change hands every five years between the rulers of nine Malaysian states headed by centuries-old Islamic royalty. While chiefly ceremonial, the position of king has in the past few years played an increasingly important role. Royal intervention was
X-37B COMPARISON: China’s spaceplane is most likely testing technology, much like US’ vehicle, said Victoria Samson, an official at the Secure World Foundation China’s shadowy, uncrewed reusable spacecraft, which launches atop a rocket booster and lands at a secretive military airfield, is most likely testing technology, but could also be used for manipulating or retrieving satellites, experts said. The spacecraft, on its third mission, was last month observed releasing an object, moving several kilometers away and then maneuvering back to within a few hundred meters of it. “It’s obvious that it has a military application, including, for example, closely inspecting objects of the enemy or disabling them, but it also has non-military applications,” said Marco Langbroek, a lecturer in optical space situational awareness at Delft
The Philippine Air Force must ramp up pilot training if it is to buy 20 or more multirole fighter jets as it modernizes and expands joint operations with its navy, a commander said yesterday. A day earlier US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that the US “will do what is necessary” to see that the Philippines is able to resupply a ship on the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) that Manila uses to reinforce its claims to the atoll. Sullivan said the US would prefer that the Philippines conducts the resupplies of the small crew on the warship Sierra Madre,
AIRLINES RECOVERING: Two-thirds of the flights canceled on Saturday due to the faulty CrowdStrike update that hit 8.5 million devices worldwide occurred in the US As the world continues to recover from massive business and travel disruptions caused by a faulty software update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, malicious actors are trying to exploit the situation for their own gain. Government cybersecurity agencies across the globe and CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz are warning businesses and individuals around the world about new phishing schemes that involve malicious actors posing as CrowdStrike employees or other tech specialists offering to assist those recovering from the outage. “We know that adversaries and bad actors will try to exploit events like this,” Kurtz said in a statement. “I encourage everyone to remain vigilant