What is left of a Swiss salary

Seen from Germany or Austria, a Swiss gross annual salary looks impressive. What lands in the account at the end of the month, and what you actually have to spend, are two further questions, and different things answer them. Asked before the contract is signed, they hold no surprises afterwards.

What comes off the gross salary

Social insurance contributions are deducted first. They cover old-age and survivors' insurance together with disability insurance and the loss-of-earnings scheme, unemployment insurance, your share of accident cover, and contributions to the occupational pension, the Pensionskasse. The occupational pension is the item that varies most: how much you contribute depends on the rules of your employer's pension fund and, as a rule, on your age.

That is why two offers naming the same gross salary can produce different net amounts. The pension fund's rules are not an annexe to skim; they belong to the papers you should ask for.

Tax at source: who it applies to

Income tax is not levied the same way for everyone in Switzerland. Anyone holding a settlement permit C, and any Swiss national living in Switzerland, is assessed in the ordinary way and pays on the basis of a tax return. Anyone without a settlement permit C, and anyone living abroad, normally pays through Quellensteuer, deducted at source: the employer takes it off the salary and passes it on.

The rate depends on the canton, on the level of income and on the family situation, that is, on whether a partner is also earning and whether there are children. The differences between cantons are considerable, and they do not run in the same direction as the differences in housing costs. A canton where tax is low can be expensive to live in.

Health insurance is yours to pay

This is the item that most surprises anyone arriving from Germany or Austria: compulsory health insurance is not deducted from a Swiss salary. You take it out yourself, per person, and you pay the premium privately. Children and family members who are not earning are not covered free of charge alongside you; each holds a policy of their own.

In your household's budget, then, health insurance sits beside the rent: a monthly outgoing you pay yourself. Comparing a Swiss net salary with the net salary you are used to at home without entering that item is comparing two different things.

Housing where the work is

The last large item is somewhere to live, and it is the most local of them all. Between a city with a university hospital and a rural area with a district hospital, rents are worlds apart, and around the larger hospitals housing is scarce in any case. Commuting trades rent against travelling time and moving trades travelling time against rent; both trades are legitimate, and both deserve a figure before you sign.

Why a general percentage helps nobody

You will find rules of thumb online for what percentage of a Swiss gross salary remains as net pay. We deliberately quote none. The reason is not caution but arithmetic: canton, municipality, type of permit, family situation, age and pension fund rules all feed into the same result. A figure that averages across all six applies to nobody, and it is at its most dangerous when it happens to sound plausible.

There is also the other side of the ledger, which such rules of thumb never mention. Many Swiss employment contracts provide for a thirteenth month's salary, and whether and how it is structured is set out in the contract. Working hours, the arrangements for shifts and on-call duty, and the number of days of leave all belong to the question of what a post is really worth.

How we work an offer through with you

When a hospital makes you an offer, we go through it with you before you accept: the gross salary, the pension fund rules, the likely tax position, health insurance and the cost of housing at that particular workplace, and alongside those the terms that carry no figure at all. Where a second offer differs, we tell you where the difference actually lies.

Nobody can calculate it bindingly except the tax authority of your canton, your health insurer and your employer's pension fund. What we can do is make sure you ask those three in good time.