In a report on public finances until 2060, published this week, Karin Keller-Suter drew attention to the massive additional costs that await our country due to the aging of its population. The forecasts of the Minister of Finance count on an increase in the active population, with Switzerland at 10 million inhabitants.
But, according to demographic researchers, this goal could become difficult to achieve. This is not because of too much immigration – as many fear – but because of too little immigration in the future. Hendrik Budliger, director of Demografik, specializing in public and private studies on the theme of aging, sees a strong risk that Switzerland will not be able to attract enough migrants in the future. Because the number of workers is decreasing across Europe. According to UN estimates, Germany and Italy alone – where Swiss employers are happy to recruit – will have 18 million fewer working people by 2050. This is a challenge in terms of financing pensions and infrastructures. So much so that specialists predict a possible depopulation of entire regions in these countries.
And for Switzerland, this means a strong risk of not being able to attract enough migrants in the future. “If we do not become a Switzerland of 10 million inhabitants, the working population will also decline here and we will have to assume considerable additional expenses for aging, precisely at a time when tax revenues are decreasing,” notes Hendrik Budliger . By 2040, the average scenario for demographic development certainly foresees a growth of 12% in the total population, to reach 10 million inhabitants. But the Swiss population of working age would only increase by 4%. This is not much, even though it is above all these workers who pay for the AVS, infrastructures or retirement homes.
Experts also predict that the decline in the working population will become as important a subject for Europe as climate change. “I therefore find it extremely frustrating that politics almost completely overshadows the topic of demography,” laments Uwe Sunde of the Institute of Political Economy at the University of Munich.
Migrant compensation
While European politicians want to fight against migration, population experts are already living in the reality of tomorrow, writes “NZZ am Sonntag”. Swiss specialist Hendrik Budliger reports that, during a conference on demography in the Nordic countries and Germany last March in Hamburg, the possibility of countries paying compensation for migrants in the future was discussed. . According to specialists, this workforce will come in particular from Congo, India, Nigeria and Pakistan. Because in these countries, the labor supply will increase by more than 400 million people by 2050.
A racist attack every 19 hours
In 2023, the Network of Advice Centers for Victims of Racism reported more cases of discrimination against foreigners than ever before, according to a forthcoming report from the Confederation, reports the “SonntagsBlick”. 876 of these cases (i.e. one attack every 19 hours) were documented and evaluated by the Network. The newspaper cites as examples the cases of schoolchildren who lock young people of color in the engine room and hurl racist insults at them. Or that of a passerby who calls a man a “nigger” and beats him into a coma.
Most of these incidents took place in the education sector and in public spaces and are motivated by xenophobia and anti-Black racism. For specialists, this shows “the urgency of structural and institutional change in educational environments, the political world, but also in the employment and housing sectors”.
