Swiss employment rises 2% as companies report skills shortages
Thursday 27th August 2026 on 11:00 in
Switzerland
Employment in Switzerland continued to grow in the second quarter of 2026, SRF reported, citing the Federal Statistical Office. The services sector created most of the new jobs, while the number of vacancies also increased from a year earlier.
At the end of June, companies outside agriculture employed 5.698 million people, including 2.388 million working part time. Women accounted for 68.2% of part-time employees.
Measured in full-time equivalents, employment totalled 4.435 million positions, an increase of 82,700, or 1.9%, from a year earlier. Women accounted for 40.5% of full-time equivalents. Overall employment rose by 111,800 positions, or 2%, while women made up 46.5% of all employees.
Services sector leads job growth
Employment in the services sector rose by 98,700 positions, or 2.2%, over the year to 4.550 million. Industry and construction added 13,100 positions, an increase of 1.2%.
Companies reported 98,700 unfilled positions in the second quarter, 2,600, or 2.7%, more than a year earlier. Vacancies in industry and construction increased by 21.8%, while those in the services sector fell by 2.4%.
University graduates face tougher entry into workforce
A separate Federal Statistical Office survey found that unemployment among university graduates had increased. Among people with a university master’s degree, the unemployment rate one year after graduation rose from 3.9% for the 2022 graduating class to 6.4% for the 2024 class. Among graduates with a bachelor’s degree from a university of applied sciences, it increased from 3.4% to 4.9%.
Many graduates also reported greater difficulty finding a job that matched their expectations. The share of university graduates with a master’s degree who said they were struggling to find such a position rose from 30% for the 2022 class to 44.1% for the 2024 class. Among bachelor’s graduates from universities of applied sciences, the figure increased from 24.2% to 36.9%.
At the same time, companies continued to struggle to find qualified workers. Some 33.9% of employees worked for a company that reported such difficulties, an increase of 0.4 percentage points from the previous quarter.
Companies nevertheless remained positive about the coming months. More firms planned to hire additional staff, while fewer expected to cut jobs. Employment prospects therefore improved compared with the previous quarter.