Poverty in Switzerland

From the 17th century, incipient industrialisation brought wealth to the cities, particularly to Zürich, but rural areas remained destitute well into the 19th century, causing the peasant war in 1653, and later forcing families to emigrate both to Russia and the Americas (including to Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Guatemala, the United States, Uruguay, and Venezuela).

[5] The top 1% richest persons own 35% of all the wealth in Switzerland, and this disparity has been increasing in recent years according to official statistics.

[2] In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic in Switzerland and the measures taken in response to it led to a recession, with many residents losing employment, income and wealth.

In Geneva, a large-scale weekly distribution of food was organised, leading to thousands of people queuing for hours to receive a bag of basic staples.

The recurring event led to a lot of comments by various politicians,[24] experts and public figures,[25][26] as well as on social media.

[16][27] In other cities too, people queued for food,[28] the absence of queues as large as those in Geneva being arguably due to differences in organisation of food distribution rather than needs,[17][29] as well as lesser fear of arrest for undocumented people,[26][30] although Geneva was probably the canton hardest hit by precarity before the coronavirus crisis.

[31] A survey conducted by Doctors without Borders and Geneva University Hospitals in which close to a third of the food parcel beneficiaries participated estimated that 60% of them lacked health insurance, with a diversity of socioeconomic profiles, including employed and unemployed people, as well as short time workers.

The survey also found that members of the disadvantaged group were almost five times more exposed to the effects of COVID-19 due to problems such as cramped living conditions and reduced possibilities of getting treatment or a test.