Do the rich create challenges for Swiss democracy? 

What role do rich people play in democracy? In the face of growing global inequality, even wealthy people are asking themselves this question.

Rich people and democracy are incompatible – at least, that is the message delivered on stage in Geld ist Klasse (Money is Class) at Theatre Chur in eastern Switzerland. The play is a plea for society to take a more critical view of “over-rich” people and for higher taxes on the wealthiest 1%. 

Among those making this demand on stage during the play is the Austrian Marlene Engelhorn. She is the heir of her grandmother, the late billionaire Traudl Engelhorn, who lived in western Switzerland. Marlene Engelhorn is known for giving away €25 million (CHF23.4 million) intended for the common good. The money went to a citizens’ assembly, whose members were selected by lot and decided how it should be spent. 

After the performance, she says on stage “over-rich” people who see their wealth as a problem can get in touch with her. 

To her, justice and democracy are at stake. The “over-richExternal link”– people wealthy enough not to need to work, according to economist Martin Schürz’s definition – undermine social trust, she believes. 

One person, one vote: that is the principle of democracy. Is it a problem if one person owns a fortune?

A million new millionaires

There are ever more millionaires worldwide, while inequality is growing. UBS’s Global Wealth ReportExternal link described 2025 as an “extraordinary year”: global private wealth grew by more than a tenth, and one million people became millionaires. At the same time, however, median wealth fell “in most markets”, according to the report. This points to a “growing divide between the wealthiest and the broader population”. 

Political developments are also causing concern, particularly in the United States, where Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, has donated hundreds of millions of dollars to Republican election campaigns. 

Oxfam’s Global Inequality Report 2026External link therefore presents “oligarchy or democracy” as opposing alternatives. The phenomenon of the “richest influencing and controlling politics” is not new, the report says, but “events in the US in 2025” made it clearer than ever before. 

In an interview with Swissinfo, Engelhorn also points to the “billionaire bubble of Silicon Valley” and its “blatant interference in the political sphere of the United States” as the clearest example of the imbalance in representative democracies caused by wealthy people who can afford “an army of lobbyists”. Her proposed solution is to tax the rich more heavily. 

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Unlike many European countries, Swiss cantons levy wealth taxes. But wealthy people who voluntarily seek to give up their riches remain the exception. One example is the left-wing activist Albin Meyer, who has called on his fellow millionaires to make a “contribution to saving the world”. 

Growing inequality is also a concern for Alfred Gantner, who is certainly no left-winger. The entrepreneur and multi-billionaire was part of a group of Swiss businessmen who visited Donald Trump in the Oval Office while the two countries were at loggerheads over tariffs. 

At almost the same time, Gantner called for higher wealth taxes on multi-millionaires in an interview with the newspaper Tages-Anzeiger, citing the “ongoing concentration of wealth”. As an example, he suggested an annual tax of CHF60 millionExternal link ($73 million) on a fortune of CHF3 billion.

Wealth inequality in Switzerland ‘lower than in US’ 

The economist Isabel Z. Martinez studies wealth and inequality at the KOF Swiss Economic Institute at federal technology institute ETH Zurich. She, too, sees the concentration of great wealth in the hands of a few as a threat to democracy. “Extremely wealthy people can spend large amounts of money on election campaigns and all kinds of lobbying,” she says. 

Martinez also draws attention to the media – specifically, billionaires who control media companies or social media platforms. The aim is clearly not to make money, she says, since providing information and news is not lucrative enough. “But it is an important public good for a functioning democracy,” she says. Information is the basis on which people form opinions. 

When pension and property wealth are taken into account, wealth inequality in Switzerland is “lower than in the US but higher than in France”, according to one of Martinez’s recent findings. 

Inequality is also relatively stable. “There has been no clear upward trend over the past 20 years,” she says. Inequality increased temporarily only before the 2008 financial crisis and during the Covid pandemic.

Much wealth is inherited

Martinez’s data show that around 60% of Switzerland’s richest residents have inherited their wealth. They form “a relatively stable group shaped to a large extent by family fortune”. 

Those who belong to Switzerland’s very richest are highly likely to remain among them for a long time. 

Many wealthy Swiss people who engage in politics come from affluent families. One example is André Hoffmann, vice-chair of pharma giant Roche and co-chair of the World Economic Forum. Among the wealthiest members of parliament are Magdalena Martullo-Blocher of the right-wing Swiss People’s Party and Simon Michel of the centre-right Radical-Liberal Party. Both head companies previously run by their fathers. 

A former commodities trader takes to the streets as a citizen 

Andreas Zivy is considerably less wealthy and less prominent, but his family also features on Bilanz magazine’s list of Switzerland’s 300 richest peopleExternal link. 

Zivy is concerned about democracy. In this, he shares Engelhorn’s concerns – but the former chairman of the commodities trading company Ameropa has drawn different conclusions. 

The 2008 financial crisis and Xi Jinping’s rise to power in China in 2013 prompted him to take a greater interest in politics. Until then, he had largely believed that prosperity and democracy would gradually spread everywhere. At the same time, he remains convinced that “there is no democracy without capitalism”. He is critical of financial capitalism but rejects what he sees as a widespread belief on the left that “capitalism is to blame for this crisis of democracy”. 

Zivy previously ran the family-owned company Ameropa as CEO. About 20 years ago, a Swiss newspaper described the company as being “as silent as the grave”. Today, he plays more of a public role. Through the Basel Democracy Foundation, he supports projects in five countries. He has also written a book, “Die dekonstruierte Gesellschaft” (The Deconstructed Society), in which he sets out what he sees as the roots of today’s problems: while science, business and society have made great strides, social cohesion has weakened. 

During the campaign ahead of the vote on the package of agreements with the European Union, Zivy plans to take to the streets “as a private citizen”. He has the money to launch projects – a form of engagement generally reserved for the wealthy. At the same time, he also participates in civic life using the means available to all Swiss citizens. 

His book is critical of social elites. Yet most people would undoubtedly regard Zivy himself – the entrepreneur, heir and philanthropist – as part of those elites. Asked about this, he says he is self-critical: during the first 30 years he worked “for the company”, he devoted “little time to political causes or the community”. 

Today, this is the central question for him: how can society develop and preserve a sense of the common good? 

Zivy predicts that Switzerland will be one of the last countries in which democracy goes “down the drain”, because social trust remains high and the country’s system of consensus politics and direct democracy works. 

Global developments ‘very worrying’ 

But Zivy finds developments around the world “very worrying”. He feels relatively alone in his concerns. “I noticed that people in my circle of acquaintances and friends, especially in my professional environment, tend to take these developments lightly,” he says. 

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He has repeatedly been surprised by the people who attract sympathy in business circles, “even the Chinese regime”. In the past, political engagement was considered part of being an entrepreneur. “Today, I see only a few people in my own circles getting involved,” Zivy says. 

The political scientist by training has “no illusions” about the impact of his foundation’s projects. But he feels a need to do something for democracy. He largely decides for himself “what we do and what we don’t”, in consultation with experts at the University of Zurich. 

Zivy uses his money to support democracy projects he believes in and for things he finds worthwhile. Engelhorn objects to the fact that super-rich people use their money to support only the causes they themselves approve of. 

What the two have in common is a sense of responsibility to contribute to society – and the conviction that more people should do so.

Edited by Meret Michel. Adapted from German by Catherine Hickley/gw