Over a third of Swiss jobs are part-time

The number of people working in Switzerland is on the rise. Meanwhile, part-time work is much more widespread in Switzerland than in the rest of Europe.

In Switzerland, 84.2% of the population aged 15 to 64 had a job in 2018 – an increase of 2.9 percentage points since 2010. Within the European Union (EU), only Iceland has a higher level of employment.

Yet 35% of Swiss jobs are part-time, reported the Federal Statistical Office on Tuesday as part of its Swiss Labour Force Survey 2018External link. That’s more than in any other EU country except for the Netherlands, where half of the jobs are part-time. The statistics office defines part-time workers in Switzerland as those working less than 90%.

Expressed in full-time equivalents, the rate of employment for Switzerland’s active population is then 72.8% on account of all the part-time jobs.

In terms of gender, 88.5% of men work, compared with 79.9% of women. The number of part-time positions in Switzerland has increased along with the number of working mothers. In 2010, two-thirds of women aged 25-54 had jobs as well as children under age 4. By 2018, it was more than 75%.