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> Positively, I work from home. I have four providers I could get 1Gbps symmetrical, unmetered, business-class FTTH for less than 100,- CHF / month. It's hard to go wrong with that.

I pay 79.99 USD a month for Verizon Fios 1 gbps in nyc. That is before a $200.00 credit. Fios is FTTH. That’s a good 20-25% discount to what you pay in Switzerland.

Plus I heard from several colleagues and friends who are people of color that they faced more racism in Switzerland (and a few European countries) than in the US. I know this is subjective and everyone’s experience is different. But you can’t ignore the fact that the CEO’s of two of the largest tech companies in the US are Indians. I don’t know of any large European companies that are being run by people of color. Maybe they are but I just don’t know.

I know a Swiss expat living in America who moved here for that exact reason. His wife is Cuban, and they said they felt more at home and accepted in the US after a few months than they did after 10 years of living in Switzerland. They both loved Switzerland, but they cited the insular culture as the primary reason for leaving. His wife just couldn't handle it anymore.

> the insular culture

Anecdotally, this is the reason most people struggle as expats in CH.

Do / can expats just hang out with each other?

Yes, out of necessity I gather. Seemingly typical of most foreign countries with strong expat presence, but Swiss are notoriously insular.

> That’s a good 20-25% discount to what you pay in Switzerland.

I actually pay 60,- CHF, plus a bit extra for a static IP + IPv6. I was saying I have that option for four providers all under 100. :)

> Plus I heard from several colleagues and friends who are people of color that they faced more racism in Switzerland

I can't speak directly to this, since I am not a PoC. What I have observed is the racism that exists appears to be of a different type than is typical in the US. It is more an aversion to outsiders than against a particular class of people. But again, I can't really speak to it since I'm not in the position to be on the receiving end of it. (Everyone thinks I'm Swiss until I open my mouth.)

The CEO of Credit Suisse is a black man from the Ivory Coast.

Not to say that racism doesn't exist in Switzerland but equally you don't see policemen shooting unarmed black people in their houses either.

That's likely attributed more to gun culture than a lack of racism

What is Swiss gun culture like? I know they have one of the highest ownership rates in the world. I was on vacation there a few months ago and was surprised to learn that the government lets you keep your service weapon at the completion of the mandatory military service. Does mandating military service for men make a big impact on gun culture there?

High gun ownership in Switzerland.

That's what obviously the article doesn't mention.

Money is not all, and I know plenty of white people too who could not handle the "arrogant Swiss people", that they had to leave the country.

You can't generalize, I agree, however when you hear more times the same complains from completely different people, you start to wonder if there is not a bit of truth in it, though. I didn't want to add negativity to the post, I just really dislike this sort of articles trying to convince people to do something they might regret.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/11pcs1/while_i_l...

Anecdotal: a friend (filipina) was married to a Dentist in Switzerland. She was generally assumed to be a prostitute or mail order bride.

Needless to say she's struggled to integrate and make friends and the country has forever tainted their experience for the worst.

Meanwhile I pay $80/month for 12Mbs cable from Comcast in Silicon Valley. My only other option is DSL. I'm not going to be moving to Switzerland any time soon, but the internet situation in the US is spotty and inconsistent at best.

20€/month for 1Gbps in France. In big cities only - in smaller cities you might get 200Mbps.

not to turn this into a 1-up session, but 100CHF is an overestimate.

i pay 49.99/mo for 10Gbps symmetric https://fiber.salt.ch/en

Last I checked, Salt is much more shaky with speeds and some of the bandwidth may be shared. With the EWZ municipal fiber in Zurich (served by one of the private companies like the GP mentioned) I get the speeds I pay for all the time. I've heard worse things about Salt, but I won't complain about a better option so I'd be happy to be proven wrong.

Germans face racism in Switzerland

Deutsche Bank used to have an Indian CEO

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anshu_Jain

Most European CEOs/presidents just aren't as well known as the US behemoths.

The CEO of one of the three largest companies in Switzerland is of Indian origin (born in the US to Indian parents, I think).

> - Negatively, it is much harder to find meetups close to you that apply to you. Unless you're based in Zürich (the tech hub of the region), expect any meetups to be irregular and if you don't go to the next one, it might be the last one.

In my experience there is a lot of meetup in Lausanne and Geneva. However it is a different kind of tech hub mostly focus on deep tech, where Zurich/zug focus mostly on Fintech/Blockchain.

Ah—that's quite possible. I'm close to St. Gallen, so either of those cities are 3-4 hours by train for me (so a bit out of the range I'd normally travel for a meetup).

How was the process of obtaining a work visa / citizenship?

It's probably easier applying to a company in the EU, if you google "EU blue card program", for IT jobs, if you have a university degree and a job offer from a company, you'll get a residency permit (what you're calling a work visa).

If you really want to move to Switzerland, be a taxpayer for 7 years in Germany, learn German, stay out of trouble and unemployment, and you can apply to be a German citizen. After that, moving to Switzerland is easy: show the authorities your job contract with a Swiss company, they're obliged to give you a residency permit (at least that's the arrangement they have with the EU at the moment)

It took me about 10 minutes at the local city hall. However, my wife is Swiss, so I'm very much an exception.

If you don't have a familial connection, you need to find a job, and the company will need to prove they couldn't find a local Swiss resident/citizen that could have done the same job, so it's a bit harder to get in than Germany or other areas of the EU.

Edit: I'm on a multi-year residency visa. I'll need to renew once more before I'm eligible for citizenship (after ~5 years).

No, they need to prove that they can't find a Swiss/EU/EEA citizen (not necessarily a resident, just an applicant) that could do the same job. EU/EEA citizens are on par with Swiss citizens in every sector except for possibly civil service, at least for now, though referendums repeatedly seem to pass that would limit this freedom for both sides.

Make sure you are knowledgeable about raclette.

https://www.thelocal.ch/20180604/brit-denied-swiss-citizensh...

I've heard similar stories, but all of the regulation surrounding citizenship is not so homogeneous between towns, cantons, etc.

So some cantons might only require a basic understanding while others grill you like this. It'll be a few years before I discover how it is in St. Gallen. :)

Based on the commune/canton residency restrictions in St. Gallen for naturalizing, I can't imagine they'd love to see people completing the process. :/

1. How easy/difficult to get Switzerland citizenship if you live and work there?

2. How popular is English language is in Switzerland IT companies?

I can comment on 2 as a swiss developer: It depends. While it might not be the prevalent spoken language, all small companies and startups i worked at so far had code comments, commit messages and issue tracker stories in english. The larger, more estabilished companies had most text in german. But everybody is willing to switch to spoken english in my experience.

This guide answers a lot of questions: https://swissdevjobs.ch/blog/how-to-find-job-as-software-dev...

Long story short: it's super easy if you are from the EU. If not, it is quite hard.

Not easy at all if you don't have any connection. Applying by simply sending a CV won't work at all. It's a different story once you're in then finding a job is pretty easy. I have several friends that have tried and the ones who made it moved first to the Switzerland subsidiary of the company they were already working for. Other had relatives in Switzerland and didn't had any reply to their applications when staying in their birth country. After moving to their relatives in Switzerland they found a job within one month.

AS an American I am sure its almost impossible. On a positive note I do speak German already.

It is a lot easier than the other way around ;)

We managed to hire Americans (and Russians, Chinese, Indians, ...) all right at my previous job. Not every employer is willing or able though, so it definitely limits your options.

1. (See above answer as well.) It's definitely difficult if you don't have a familial connections. Once you get in, though, it's pretty easy to stay and if you stay for 10+ years, you can get citizenship fairly easily.

2. It is mixed. I've had local interviews in (high) German but they were comfortable enough to switch to English if needed. Most jobs list proficiency in English + German as a requirement.

Citizenship is relatively hard: you have to be a resident for 12+ years to start the process. A lot of people never bother - a long term residency permit ("C") is almost as good, but you don't vote and do not have military duties.

Everybody speaks English; I know a number of people in Zürich who never bothered to learn German, as there is a large expat community and everything is multi-lingual.

> I know a number of people in Zürich who never bothered to learn German

I think Zürich is just a typical large city exception (similar to Berlin or Amsterdam). I think German (or French or Italian) is pretty necessary outside of Zürich/Geneva.

If you have children and want citizenship for them, one of the parents must be Swiss.

As for language, I took an intensive French class at the University of Geneva when I worked there. At the end of the class everyone in it, students from all over the world, spoke better English. We studied French but socialized in English.

It's 10+ years for citizenship as of a few years ago. Also, I doubt the military duties will apply to the vast majority of people that move there as adults and then start the process of residency and naturalization.

> 1. How easy/difficult to get Switzerland citizenship if you live and work there?

I know someone who was born there, raised there, currently lives there (after a while in North America) and does not having citizenship or want to go through the hassle.

From what she says it's a massive pain in the ass.

"How easy/difficult to get Switzerland citizenship if you live and work there"

"From what she says it's a massive pain in the ass."

This statement is true, but geting citizenship is not required to stay in Switzerland basicly vor ever as long as u have work

She has an EU passport for her and her kid (husband is american though).

I'm in Zurich, moved recently from South Africa - also in the startup space, currently working remotely, also from home.

Would love to grab a coffee sometime if you're keen - your website in your profile doesn't resolve - does the email work?

Just fixed up the domain, thanks for reminding me. :)

Yes the email works: hello <at> lukeseelenbinder <dot> com. Let's definitely meet up! I'm in St. Gallen, so not far at all.

How was the process of moving from the US to Switzerland? I'm a senior engineer, and I'm open to moving there to work, but I don't have the slightest idea of how I would go about finding places to interview or find a job. How did you find yours? Are there recruiters to bring in out-of-country talent? I feel like that would be a massive hurdle, considering you would need a visa. Any advice on finding a job?

Edit: I'm an idiot, that's a job site. Some of the question still stands, how was the process of finding a job out of the country and getting a visa?

I'm an American living and working in Zurich for Google. Frankly - without Google handling every part of the process for me it would have been extremely difficult to get the visa.

The best route you have into a job here as an American (or other non-schengen area resident) is to find a company already doing business here, get hired, and then transfer here.

But once here... it is very nice

I actually moved because of family (wife) vs because of a job, so I brought my job with me.

The few interviews I've had have been through friends knowing friends, but there's a good number of job sites dedicated to Switzerland.

Getting a visa as a third-country citizen (i.e., not EU or CH) is difficult and you need to find the right company that's willing to jump through the hoops for you. Definitely doable if your skillset is right, but it's going to be unique for each situation. A more viable option may be by using an EU country as a springboard (get EU residency, which, in my understanding, can improve your chances of getting a visa in CH).

Have you found there to be a significant language barrier when moving to Switzerland? I know Europeans generally know English, but is there an expectation that you speak German or another local language?

I'm Swiss but we have a lot of people from different places working here. Many Swiss people are totally fine with English, and since we speak Swiss german, nobody expect you speak it anyway.

That said, in our case, working for Banks, you do still connect to the 'old school' Swiss buissness who are a little less English driven then the Tech sector. That has caused some issues for us, but not all that significant.

Not OP, but I have so e experience particularly in Zurich. English is widely spoken by a majority of the people you'll be working with, but some sort of basic German can go a very long way. Compared to other cities like Paris or Strasbourg (other tech-ish cities), Zurich is far more English friendly, perhaps only second to Amsterdam.

It’s a bit harder in French Switzerland, particularly Lausanne, some of the people don’t speak English or simply don’t want to. Still not that bad, however.

The police l, if you have to interact with them, might treat you more roughly if you don’t speak the local language.

I spoke enough German to make the transition to Swiss German okay. It's definitely a barrier and I'm still working through it. Most people can and do speak English if they think their English is smoother than your German / Swiss German.

Outside of major, cosmopolitan cities (pretty much Zürich and Geneva), I'd say there is an expectation to speak the local language. Anything official I've done has been in German.

What are the ways to get a visa? You've said you married a Swiss woman, and that work visas are only available to non-EU people when companies couldn't find a Swiss (or EU) person to do the job. I suppose there's also some kind of "millionaire visa". Is that it? How hard are each of these categories of visa to get?

Why an expat. Is it something with the work permit. How does one transition from expat to immigrant ?

Technically, yes. I use the term "expat" to denote that I'm not a Swiss citizen yet; the definition is pretty broad and can include immigrants: https://www.wordnik.com/words/expat.

All expats by definition are immigrants, not all immigrants are expats. Normally refers to high qualified high earning individuals while in most places most immigrants are low skilled low wage and only a small group would be reasonably called expats.

If you google expat vs immigrant it's contentious.. https://www.thelocal.de/20140617/are-you-an-expat-or-immigra...

What type of visa do you have and how did you qualify for it? Was it difficult to get?

Answered here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21258550.

I'm very much an exception to the norm. I would have looked at Germany first if I were unmarried.

I'm based in Zurich, also happy to connect.

Let's! My email is in my profile.

Are there 95-100% remote jobs?

I've been working in Switzerland for 6 months, from what I've seen it is very common to find jobs with 1 day a week working from home but very unusual to find 100% remote jobs

From what I've seen, it's less common than the US but they do exist.

Usually blockchain-based stuff around Zug.