![The four-metre-long painting "Sonntag der Bergbauern" [Sunday of the Mountain Farmers, 1923-24/26] had to be removed by a crane from the German Chancellery in Berlin for the exhibition in Bern.](https://www.swissinfo.ch/content/wp-content/uploads/sites/13/2025/12/01_Pressebild_KirchnerxKirchner.jpg?crop=1165px,0px,1670px,1670px&w=480&ver=cb688ed5)
Financial packages soften hits to labour market
The first two financial-stimulus packages infused into the Swiss economy are paying off by preserving jobs, the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs said on Sunday.
SECO’s chief labour economist, Serge Gaillard, said layoffs could have been much worse as the financial boost saved thousands of jobs and even created some.
In an interview with the SonntagsZeitung newspaper, Gaillard said blows to the construction industry had been particularly softened as the money raised more than SFr500 million ($484.5 million) in new contracts.
Gaillard said the country should feel a noticeable improvement in the labour market in 2011. “We’re facing a difficult year in 2010,” he cautioned.
That has not stopped Gaillard from supporting cost-cutting measures in unemployment insurance, an area targeted by centre-right parties for savings reforms.
The proposal would reduce the number of days that the young and unemployed could receive benefits.
swissinfo.ch and agencies
In compliance with the JTI standards
More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here . Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.