Initiative in favour of individual taxation gets green light

Campaigners handing in the signatures in Bern in September. © Keystone / Peter Klaunzer

A people’s initiative calling for an end to the practice of taxing married couples as a single unit has been handed in and validated by authorities for a possible future vote.

The initiative, “for an individual taxation independent of civil status”, was handed in by campaigners last month. On Tuesday, the Federal Chancellery said it had validated the signatures collected, 100,000 of which are needed to launch a national vote.

The initiative is the latest effort to end the practice of joint taxation of married couples, which opponents see as punitive and discriminatory: while single and non-married couples are taxed individually in Switzerland, married couples are taxed on joint income, which for many means higher rates once they tie the knot.

A national vote in 2016 calling for an overhaul of the system was narrowly rejected by citizens (see above). However, the Federal Court later ordered a re-vote on the issue as information about how many people would be affected by the change, given by the government, was deemed to be inaccurate.

That a re-vote didn’t take place sooner was largely down to the initial backers of the plan, from the Centre party, who decided to withdraw the original initiative and work on a separate project that would also include married gay couples. It is also currently collecting signatures for two separate initiatives on the issue, the Keystone-SDA news agency says.

Meanwhie it’s unclear whether the initiative validated this week, driven by members of the centre-right Liberal Radical Party, will actually come to vote: the government is also currently working on proposals to ease the tax burden on married couples, which it plans to send out for consultation this autumn.