Economy Of Switzerland

Switzerland is a small landlocked European country. Switzerland's economy is based on the market system.

Switzerland has little to no resources such as iron ore or natural gas. Switzerland lacks in important minerals such as coal, oil, and gas which heavy industry is based on. most of the land is to high, and can not support successfully agriculture. Switzerland has small deposits of iron and manganese as well as; lime, salts, sand, gravels, clay and Marble. Although the country has little natural resource it is abundant in rivers. which the Swiss have used to produce huge amounts of Hydro power. The hydro electricity industry is Switzerland's greatest resource.

The largest sector of the Economy by employment standards is the community and personal services sector.

Finance, insurance etc: 580,000

Community and personal services: 813,000

Restaurants, hotels, Tourism: 800,000

Manufacturing and Mining: 689,000

Switzerland is a market economy. A market economy allows the businesses and consumers to decide what goods to buy and produce by themselves, with no direction from government inputs. these decisions are influenced by supply, demand and competition. in a market economy businesses decide what to produce, how much to produce, how much to charge consumers and how much to pay employees. in the market economy businesses and firms are owned by private companies instead of the government.

The Swiss industry is based on highly developed specialized products and services. they produce: Turbines, watches, precision instruments, textiles, chemicals and foodstuffs. Mechanical and Electrical engineering accounts for nearly 44% of all export earnings. almost half of the Manufacturing and Mining industry is employed here. The economy is more labour intensive, because it has little resources to export without labour to develop them into finished products.

The Swiss economy is dependant on its hydro-electric resources. Hydro-electricity accounts for nearly a third of the nations power. If the electricity was not available machines used to produce the specialised products could not be used. The machines used do the jobs of people, so less workers a required to produce the final product. this means firms don't have to charge as much in order to pay workers.

One problem that faces the Swiss economy is that it is dependant upon its exports. Swiss exports are the largest contributes to the nations income. if foreign countries turn to cheaper products instead of buying from the Swiss, Switzerland's economy will collapse. Germany is the largest importer of Swiss goods, nearly 20%.

Switzerland and Australia are both market economies and export large amounts to oversea countries. Australian governments have little say into economic decisions like that of Switzerland, and the firms can choose what to produce and how much.