Switzerland

Switzerland's Rankings
CategoryRankScore
Overall Rank478.44
Corporate Taxes1067.8
Individual Taxes1567.55
Consumption Taxes1100
Property Taxes3536.44
Crossborder Taxes299.03

Switzerland ranks 4th overall on the 2021 International Tax Competitiveness Index, the same as in 2020.


Strengths

  • Switzerland has above-average cost recovery provisions for investments in machinery, buildings, and intangibles.
  • Switzerland has a broad tax treaty network, with 93 countries.
  • The Swiss VAT of 7.7 percent applies to a broad base and has very low compliance costs.

Weaknesses

  • Switzerland has multiple distortionary property taxes with separate levies on real estate transfers, net wealth, estates, assets, and financial transactions.
  • Companies are limited in the time period in which they can use net operating losses to offset future profits and are unable to use losses to reduce past taxable income.
  • The VAT exemption threshold is almost twice as high as the OECD average.

Learn more about the tax system in Switzerland

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