Hacker News Reader

Comment by ohthehugemanate | Hacker News Reader

The cost of living should be considered along with their income tax rate. It varies from canton (province) to canton, but hovers around 10%.

That's a great deal compared to most any other European country. In neighboring Germany for instance, if you earn €55k, your tax rate is about 44% (including solidarity surcharge). In Zurich it's about 11% (canton plus federal tax). The top rates are 47% and 16%, respectively.

So it's not much surprise that people want to live there, despite the high cost of living.

View on HN

11% in Zurich? Only at the lowest wages, like a cashier. The tax progression is steep and the rates quickly become comparable to other european countries. In Zurich marginal tax rate levels at about 40% pretty quickly for higher than average earner.

I’m not sure which part I’m missing here, but I’m living in Zürich and I pay about 40% taxes, not merely 11%…?

I'm amazed by this 40% which you and zavandor are paying. I'm living in Zurich as well and I'm not paying even half of that (and no I'm not working as a cashier). If I'm looking at the tax rates of the canton Zurich then the maximum you can be charged for, cantonal and federal taxes combined, is 26.2%: http://taxsummaries.pwc.com/uk/taxsummaries/wwts.nsf/ID/Swit...

You forgot municipal tax, which is 119% of cantonal in Zürich. 40% tax rate that I was talking is marginal tax rate, i.e. from a certain and fairly low point the state will pocket 400 Fr in taxes out of every additional 1000 Fr of your income. And then there's 5.1% AHV and other social things on top...

Let's take somebody with an annual income of 200,000 CHF, a well above average income. According to https://en.comparis.ch/steuern/steuervergleich/steuern-im-ve..., the total federal, cantonal and municipal taxes together would be 51,410 CHF per annum, about 25%.

That is a lot below any other European country. Maybe you included VAT to come up with your 40% marginal tax rate? But then you should count VAT for other countries as well when you are comparing them. And apart from that, the VAT in Switzerland is also very low.

When that somebody earns 10k more, he'll pay 3948 CHF of taxes on those 10k => 39.48% marginal tax rate.

In Belgium about half of your salary goes to taxes.

Is it worth it?

No. Services from the state are crap. Motorways and roads are crap. Healthcare is good but not free. A country with 11 million people and 8 parliaments.

People holding government jobs and on welfare would say "yes, definitely".

Government jobs like the people that takes care of mental illness, policemen trained to act in a thoughtful way, teachers, etc.

I'm happy to live in a country with high taxes and a good level of services for every one. To be in San Francisco, for example, was a sad experience. There was so much money and good people, but still you could see so much homeless people in the streets.

So you don't benefit at all from other people's taxes?

No, unless you have 10 children I guess. I was single at the time and basically it's a net loss compared to married couples with kids.

No.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com