Euro Franc exchange rate development and gender specific labor market data.

After the hike of the euro exchange rate on Monday, the Swiss franc recovered slightly in the following days. Especially on Thursday the EUR CHF rate has fallen further below the mark of 1,135 francs for one euro. Changing francs to euros will continue to be favorable for cross-border commuters. Thus, the chf euro exchange rate has already been in the range between 1.125 and 1.145 francs to Euro for around for 6 months now.

Favorable exchange rate

Regardless of the exchange rate development, it is important to compare the exchange rates of different providers. Use our Euro Franc Currency Converter on exchangemarket.ch to compare exchange rates in Switzerland. This way you can quickly and easily find the best exchange rate in Switzerland.

Inequality between working men and women in Switzerland still significant

Switzerland has equality between women and men written in the constitution since 1981. Still though gender differences are significant when it comes to working life. Salaries, working time, rate of employment or representation in management positions are quite different between men and women as many reports and data show.

Employment rate differences

When it comes to employment, either taking into the account temporary, full time jobs and also employment of residents or cross-border workers, the percentage of population above the age of 15 that has paid jobs is higher among men generally worldwide. Switzerland is no exception – around 60% of women over 15 is employed, whereas among men this percentage stand at 70. The biggest gender gap is observed in Turkey, Switzerland is placed at 18th spot – the situation is better in countries like Germany, France, Norway, Sweden – the last is in OECD countries’ ranking at 36th spot. Switzerland is in middle of the table, so there is a place for improvement still.

Wages of women and men

A gender gap in salaries is a fact in majority of countries, and a significant difference can also be observed in Switzerland: women earn as much as 14.8% less on average as the OECD data for 2016 showed. Wages that are subject to research are median ones, which means half of working population earn more and half less. The trend is optimistic though – in recent years average of salaries in CHF for women has increased and the gender hap has narrowed. In 1996, for instance, women earned less than men by 25.5%. As Swiss Statistical Office shows the gender gap is expanding the higher is the position in corporate ladder, which means still women as bosses earn much less than men in managerial positions.

Representation in management

Speaking of managers – how does the representation of women and men in high corporate positions look like? Still much more men take high position in companies and this is a case in all of the OECD countries. In 2016 more men held decision-making managerial position than women. The countries with the best representation of women as managers are Latvia with 47.25%, Poland with 41.17% and Slovenia with 40.84%. Rest of the countries has less than 40% of women in managerial positions and in Switzerland this percentage stands at 35.88%, which gives its 11th spot in the table. The worst situation is in South Korea where only 10% of management jobs are held by women.

Gender gap in working time pattern

A significant gender gap is observed when it comes to part-time and full-time jobs. In all OECD countries more women take on part-time jobs than men, and the difference is the biggest in Switzerland and Netherlands. In 2017 data shows that as much as 47% of all employed women worked 30 hours or less per week, whereas the same applied to only 11.2% of men. When it comes to full-time job it is performed by more than 80% of men and only 41% of women.

What about politics?

Let’s look now at parliament representation – a specific type of employment and an example of how much influence on country’s politics each gender has. Women are being elected to parliaments around the globe, but are minorities in them. In Switzerland women occupy 64 seats out of 200 in the House of Representatives. It gives the country only 37th spot in the table of all 194 countries. The proportion of women in chambers are better in countries like Finland, Sweden, Mexico, but also – surprisingly – Bolivia, Costa Rica or Rwanda. Taking into the account only OECD countries, Switzerland, with 32% proportion of women’s representation in the biggest chamber, sits at 16th spot. The best ranked Mexico can boast of 48% representation of women in the biggest chamber of Parliament.