An increasing number of Zurich apartments are rented as Airbnbs, adding to housing shortage; initiative calls for air travellers pay extra tax for polluting the environment; and more Swiss news in our roundup this Friday.
Amid housing shortage, thousands of Zurich apartments are rented out as Airbnbs
Despite the ongoing and worsening housing shortage in the city, the number of dwellings rented as Airbnb – 5,320 units – is on the rise.
Their share is particularly high in Districts 1 and 4, according to new figures released by Zurich’s Statistics Office.
Generally, however, flats being rented as Airbnbs – and therefore out of reach for ‘regular’ tenants – is increasing in almost all districts.
Initiative to make air travellers pay extra tax is launched
The environmental organisation ‘active-trafiC’ has launched an initiative against “heavy air traffic” on Thursday.
Its premise is that residents of Switzerland leaving the country to travel abroad must pay a surcharge based on the fuel consumption resulting from their journey. The goal: to reduce the desire to fly in order to protect the climate.
“We really need to do more to protect the climate, but air traffic continues to increase in Switzerland nonetheless,” said Franziska Ryser, co-president of the Green Party, one of the initiative’s instigators. “If the country wants to achieve its climate goals, it is essential to reverse this trend.”
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Study: One percent of the population owns a third of all Swiss wealth
Switzerland is considered one of the richest countries in the world, yet the distribution of that wealth is increasingly unequal.
According to the World Inequality Database (WID), the richest 1 percent of the population owns over 31 percent of total private wealth, while the poorest half owns just 3.7 percent.
And the same research indicates that foreigners are overrepresented at the top of the wealth ladder. Many benefit from the flat tax regime, which taxes based on the cost of living in Switzerland rather than on overall income or assets. This often criticized exception contributes to the high concentration of wealth in the country compared to other countries.
The gap appears enormous even in absolute terms: half the population has an average of 25,000 francs per capita, while the richest 1 percent possess over 21 million francs per capita.
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Travel news: Finnair launches flights from Zurich to Lapland this winter
The new route – from Zurich to Kittilä, a city located north of the Arctic Circle – is launched just in time for the start of the main season for Lapland travel and will be flown twice a week – on Wednesdays and Saturdays.
Finnair thus enters into direct competition with Edelweiss, which already serves the same route in the winter, on Mondays and Wednesday.
READ ALSO: The new flights to and from Switzerland this autumn and winter
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