Switzerland’s government rejected a proposal to jack up inheritance taxes on the super rich, diminishing the chances of the plan passing in a national vote.
For context, it was clear from the outset that the right wing-free market gov would reject this. The proposed tax was submitted by the Juso (young socialist party) and it’s pretty clear that it will lose a national vote as well by a large margin (as the Swiss voting population is worse free market brained than even the US).
Now why would I consider this still a good move by the Juso? Because it brings up debate. About inheritance tax, but also about the injust society in general and how rich people don’t contribute their part. And in the long term, it moved the overton window to strech further to the left.
I’m Swiss and open to answer questions if you have any.
Not of our own volition, but we were luckily forced under threat of sanctions by the USA and EU to accept the OECD standard Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA). So now there is some form of automatic information flow to other countries tax authorities. But I don’t understand the workings in detail.
The country? No. But remember we’ve always been (majority) governed by parties that are right-wing corporate lackeys. There’s a lot of criticism of these practices from the left and even the center (sometimes), but those critics are unable to get majorities.
Because it made us wealthy? And because Switzerland has strong social security and failing in that free market is unpleasent but you will not go bankrupt or become homless.
That is ignoring the environmental destruction and what it does to other countries but for us the free market together with social policies worked wonders and people are keen to keep that alive.
Yes quite sure, if you are homeless you are so by choice. The government will provide for you, not unconditionally (you are required to look for a job or reeducate) but they will.
What if you can’t work? It was more of a rethorical question, as I know from personal experience, you can be very close to homelessness very quick. The different agencies will tell you that another is resposible and you get nothing for a very long time.
Yes it is a lot better rhan in the US and other places, but homeless people being homeless by choice is just not true and frankly a disgusting claim.
Can you prove this is a systematic issue? I know various people who lost their job or had to claim IV and not one of these was at risk of loosing the roof over their head.
No an individual case might be a mistake. You would have to proof a systematic behaviour of our government to prove that it does not usually work fine.
As someone already commented, there is narrative that the free market is the reason for Switzerland’s success. A narrative pushed by corporate media and burguois politicians of course, but imo also not completely untrue.
But I also want to point to a different reason, which is our value system. Due to historical reasons, similar to the US, there is a strong emphasis on personal freedom, usually overshadowing solidarity and equality. A big part of that is for many people the right to own private property and to play as little taxes on it as possible.
Then there’s also protentatisms ideas about work etc.
How do you feel about Switzerland’s semi direct democracy governance?
What do you like and what do you think needs to be improved.
How are your gun laws structured? Could you briefly describe the purchasing process? Do private citizens have to store their firearms in a centralized location or can they keep them secured at home?
Sorry this is off topic, and might be to much to ask. Feel free to answer what you’re comfortable with or ignore me. Appreciate you answering questions people have none the less.
How do you feel about Switzerland’s semi direct democracy governance?
Now I’m not sure which part you mean, the direct voting or our parliament / government?
In short, I think the biggest flaw which is directly a part of the system is our Ständerat and Ständemehr, which is basically like the US Senate, where the voice of a person from Uri counts 500 times as much as the voice of someone from Zurich.
Then there are the problems outside of it, where I’d say the biggest one is Corporate money influencing voting and elections.
And while sometimes misused, I still like our direct voting on issues. In the past 10 years we (from the left) were able to prevent multiple things decided by the parliament thanks to this system and even succeeded in winning a proposal to raise pensions for poorer people, which (winning a equality issue proposal) has never happened before in Swiss history.
How are your gun laws structured? Could you briefly describe the purchasing process? Do private citizens have to store their firearms in a centralized location or can they keep them secured at home?
As a Swiss citizen, owning a gun is pretty easy. I’m not an expert and don’t own one, but afaik to buy a gun, one needs to do a background check and have some basic training with it. You can keep your gun at home, but carrying (hidden or open) is only allowed in exceptional cases, e.g. for professional reasons, and must be allowed in a court decision.
I hope these answers cover it more or less, feel free to ask more :-)
Doesn’t this incentivize the state causing more death and individuals not wanting to improve their property/business if they can’t choose who gets it after they pass?
What??? That’s the craziest shit I’ve heard today, that would mean any country with universal healthcare would be incentivized to kill their citizens as soon as possible because it saves money.
Not if they made it a point to split ownership with those alive before they died. Its not really all that hard its mostly a greed and control thing. Farm with two parents and three kids could have each parent with a 35% ownership stake and 10% for each kid but if both parents died it would be a severe tax day. If they did 20% a piece then if the kids were older they could buy out what was left and the parents could sell of theirs as they got older to avoid the tax. That being said I could see some allowed inheritance level like a million.
At least in Finland you can’t give tax free gifts over a small amount. So you can’t give part of your company to your children beforehand. The only way things like family farms can be inherited is that at least some part of inheritances is tax free.
Not to mention that farms are usually run by one family. Hard to imagine siblings wanting to live and work on the same farm together.
These are difficult issues. I don’t think we can figure out a perfect system, we are going to have to live with flaws.
It really is, the best kind of inheritance tax is a progressive one that is zero until a person inherits the equivalent of a median apartment.
This tax is politically tricky though because it’s an emotionally charged topic that is easy to get people riled up. Think “Labor is taxed, financial gains are taxed, gas is taxed, products are taxed, retirement income is taxed and death is taxed also?” vibes.
There is also a question of farmers since you need a farm of a certain size to be competitive and that’s usually land that’s worth a lot of money. It’ll basically make it impossible to transition individual farmers between generations since they’re always just barely getting by and surely not going to be able to afford the tax.
The Brits added an exemption for farmland and the rich use it as a loophole now.
I say fuck it, redistribution once per generation is really good for the economy.
Just read a post on linkedin (yeah i know) from Andri Silberschmidt, vice-president of the market-liberal FDP, warning of the initiative. It sounded like he was afraid hehe
For context, it was clear from the outset that the right wing-free market gov would reject this. The proposed tax was submitted by the Juso (young socialist party) and it’s pretty clear that it will lose a national vote as well by a large margin (as the Swiss voting population is worse free market brained than even the US).
Now why would I consider this still a good move by the Juso? Because it brings up debate. About inheritance tax, but also about the injust society in general and how rich people don’t contribute their part. And in the long term, it moved the overton window to strech further to the left.
I’m Swiss and open to answer questions if you have any.
Has the country ever done anything to stop being “that country where rich assholes and all sorts of corrupt people have a secret bank account”?
Not of our own volition, but we were luckily forced under threat of sanctions by the USA and EU to accept the OECD standard Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA). So now there is some form of automatic information flow to other countries tax authorities. But I don’t understand the workings in detail.
Here’s an article from that time (2016) that gives a good overview, but you’ll have to use machine translation, as the english version of the article is way shorter and less informative: https://www.swissinfo.ch/ger/politik/automatischer-informationsaustausch-in-steuerfragen_die-schweiz-begraebt-das-bankgeheimnis-auch-fuer-eu-buerger/42194104
The country? No. But remember we’ve always been (majority) governed by parties that are right-wing corporate lackeys. There’s a lot of criticism of these practices from the left and even the center (sometimes), but those critics are unable to get majorities.
As a nearby neutral power: Is the peak of Mont Blanc French, Italian, or both?
Surprisingly, it’s Bulgarian.
And that place we think of as Bulgaria is actually a combination of territories belonging to Azerbaijan and Lesotho.
And Lesotho is of course just the original indigenous name for Peru
You know who you never hear about? Uruguay.
Seems suspicious. What are they up to?
Probably preparing for the World Cup in secrecy, which is why we only see them once every 4 years.
It belongs to the Ibex
source: am Swiss and also did a partial climb of the mont Blanc in my youth
Why are Swiss so “free market brained”?
Because it made us wealthy? And because Switzerland has strong social security and failing in that free market is unpleasent but you will not go bankrupt or become homless.
That is ignoring the environmental destruction and what it does to other countries but for us the free market together with social policies worked wonders and people are keen to keep that alive.
Are you sure about that?
Yes quite sure, if you are homeless you are so by choice. The government will provide for you, not unconditionally (you are required to look for a job or reeducate) but they will.
What the hell is this, socialism? 🥴
What if you can’t work? It was more of a rethorical question, as I know from personal experience, you can be very close to homelessness very quick. The different agencies will tell you that another is resposible and you get nothing for a very long time.
Yes it is a lot better rhan in the US and other places, but homeless people being homeless by choice is just not true and frankly a disgusting claim.
Can you prove this is a systematic issue? I know various people who lost their job or had to claim IV and not one of these was at risk of loosing the roof over their head.
I don’t have to prove anything, as an indovidual case invalidates your claim.
No an individual case might be a mistake. You would have to proof a systematic behaviour of our government to prove that it does not usually work fine.
As someone already commented, there is narrative that the free market is the reason for Switzerland’s success. A narrative pushed by corporate media and burguois politicians of course, but imo also not completely untrue.
But I also want to point to a different reason, which is our value system. Due to historical reasons, similar to the US, there is a strong emphasis on personal freedom, usually overshadowing solidarity and equality. A big part of that is for many people the right to own private property and to play as little taxes on it as possible.
Then there’s also protentatisms ideas about work etc.
Because they profit, a lot.
How do you feel about Switzerland’s semi direct democracy governance?
What do you like and what do you think needs to be improved.
How are your gun laws structured? Could you briefly describe the purchasing process? Do private citizens have to store their firearms in a centralized location or can they keep them secured at home?
Sorry this is off topic, and might be to much to ask. Feel free to answer what you’re comfortable with or ignore me. Appreciate you answering questions people have none the less.
Now I’m not sure which part you mean, the direct voting or our parliament / government? In short, I think the biggest flaw which is directly a part of the system is our Ständerat and Ständemehr, which is basically like the US Senate, where the voice of a person from Uri counts 500 times as much as the voice of someone from Zurich.
Then there are the problems outside of it, where I’d say the biggest one is Corporate money influencing voting and elections.
And while sometimes misused, I still like our direct voting on issues. In the past 10 years we (from the left) were able to prevent multiple things decided by the parliament thanks to this system and even succeeded in winning a proposal to raise pensions for poorer people, which (winning a equality issue proposal) has never happened before in Swiss history.
As a Swiss citizen, owning a gun is pretty easy. I’m not an expert and don’t own one, but afaik to buy a gun, one needs to do a background check and have some basic training with it. You can keep your gun at home, but carrying (hidden or open) is only allowed in exceptional cases, e.g. for professional reasons, and must be allowed in a court decision.
I hope these answers cover it more or less, feel free to ask more :-)
deleted by creator
To me inheritance is the fairest thing to tax. Everything should go to the state at death.
Doesn’t this incentivize the state causing more death and individuals not wanting to improve their property/business if they can’t choose who gets it after they pass?
What??? That’s the craziest shit I’ve heard today, that would mean any country with universal healthcare would be incentivized to kill their citizens as soon as possible because it saves money.
Judging by life expectancy, this is not the case.
That would destroy a lot of family business like farms.
Not if they made it a point to split ownership with those alive before they died. Its not really all that hard its mostly a greed and control thing. Farm with two parents and three kids could have each parent with a 35% ownership stake and 10% for each kid but if both parents died it would be a severe tax day. If they did 20% a piece then if the kids were older they could buy out what was left and the parents could sell of theirs as they got older to avoid the tax. That being said I could see some allowed inheritance level like a million.
At least in Finland you can’t give tax free gifts over a small amount. So you can’t give part of your company to your children beforehand. The only way things like family farms can be inherited is that at least some part of inheritances is tax free.
Not to mention that farms are usually run by one family. Hard to imagine siblings wanting to live and work on the same farm together.
These are difficult issues. I don’t think we can figure out a perfect system, we are going to have to live with flaws.
It really is, the best kind of inheritance tax is a progressive one that is zero until a person inherits the equivalent of a median apartment.
This tax is politically tricky though because it’s an emotionally charged topic that is easy to get people riled up. Think “Labor is taxed, financial gains are taxed, gas is taxed, products are taxed, retirement income is taxed and death is taxed also?” vibes.
There is also a question of farmers since you need a farm of a certain size to be competitive and that’s usually land that’s worth a lot of money. It’ll basically make it impossible to transition individual farmers between generations since they’re always just barely getting by and surely not going to be able to afford the tax.
The Brits added an exemption for farmland and the rich use it as a loophole now.
I say fuck it, redistribution once per generation is really good for the economy.
Just read a post on linkedin (yeah i know) from Andri Silberschmidt, vice-president of the market-liberal FDP, warning of the initiative. It sounded like he was afraid hehe
Good lord Silberschmidt is probably one of my most hated persons in Swiss politics.
I suppose inheritance would still be subject to income tax? Wouldn’t it be better to have more income tax slabs?
There is zero taxation on Inheritance in certain cantons. Or am I misunderstanding your question?
As in if you inherit some assets valued at X, is it treated as an additional source of income for that year, or as a tax free gift?
In most places, if you’re a child or spouse of the deceased, you don’t pay any tax at all on it.
Sometimes it’s taxed specifically as inheritance, but never as income as fas as I know.
It depends on the canton but where I live it is a tax free gift.
Thanks for the context!