There is peace, joy, pancakes in Switzerland! At least when it comes to strikes. Leaving a job in protest is somehow not welcome by workers in this country. In Switzerland, only one working day is lost per 1,000 employees per year. It’s very different in France. Strikes are practically rigid there. There is a loss of 93 working days per year for every 1000 employees.
But meanwhile, the number of strikes and strike threats is increasing in Switzerland. Swiss pilots threaten to stay on the ground at the end of October. More than 20,000 people from Büezer recently voted for a nationwide pause at construction sites. In Geneva, the employees of the transport company TPG went on strike last week, and the taxi drivers this week. A snapshot corresponding to a train according to Christian Koller (51). “Unions are less afraid of strikes today than they were at the end of the 20th century,” says the historian and director of the Swiss Social Archives in Zurich.
Shortage of skilled workers encourages desire to strike
Whereas in the past those who went on strike were mostly the workforce of large companies or all sectors such as construction, today they are more often employees of smaller companies. There are strikes in stores and distribution companies.
The economic environment may further support the growing desire to strike. In many industries, companies are desperately looking for workers. “The shortage of skilled workers puts workers in a stronger negotiating position,” says Koller.
Swiss labor peace is the trump card
The low number of strikes so far in Switzerland is one of the reasons why Switzerland is so attractive to international investors and companies. « Fewer strikes and motivated employees mean planning security. Industrial peace is still an important value and a trump card in international competition,” says economic historian Bernhard Ruetz (54).
But now the tone in the negotiations seems to be getting tougher, at least in some sectors. On the one hand, employers complain of insatiable wage demands. The airline says staff costs for pilots will rise from 1 billion to 1.2 billion if Switzerland responds to requests from the Aeropers pilots association.
Strike as a last resort
Unions, on the other hand, are increasingly complaining of attacks on collective bargaining agreements (GAVs) in sectors. “So far we have been able to fend off these attacks and even improve GAV coverage in Switzerland – unlike many other countries,” said Vania Alleva, 52, President of Unia. If a CLA applies, strikes are not allowed.
Alleva attributes the unions’ tougher stance to “massive attacks on workers’ rights”. Employers will want to abolish labor laws and make employment relationships more flexible. Strikes are the last but also the most effective tool for workers. Unions never underestimate the threat of strikes because any strike is associated with great stress and risk for strikers.
“The radicalization of some unions”
At the liberal think tank Avenir Suisse, however, the unions are to blame. “We see an ideological radicalization in some unions,” says Peter Grünenfelder (55). The director of Avenir Suisse sees this as a dangerous development: The problem is that unions are losing too many members and therefore represent fewer and fewer workers. In 1960, 29 percent of the workforce was still unionized; In 2020, this rate was only 13 percent. “Unions are becoming more and more radical as they become less and less important,” says Grünenfelder.
The director of Avenir Suisse fears that Switzerland will become less attractive as a workplace. “We are already having trouble maintaining our attractiveness due to the backlog of decisions in federal politics. If the number of strikes increases, we will continue to lose here.”
French strike 48 times more
Historian Bernhard Degen (70), of the University of Basel, assures: “Historical strike statistics challenge the fact that there is a link between economic development and the number of strikes.” In other words: even where there are many strikes, the economy can flourish and is therefore still attractive to investors and companies from abroad.
Even as strikes in Switzerland increase, it is still a long way off the podium in most countries. Calculated per capita, the US has 9 times as many strike days. 18 times more in Germany, 48 times more in France! Switzerland has not yet completely gotten rid of its role model image.