Hello,

I've just been offered a job in Geneva and wondered if the salary of 65,000 swiss francs was enough for a single person to live on. If I come I'll be an American working at a private international school. My family will arrive a little later, and obviously my wife will need to work as well.

For one, its "okay".... but one question: when will you family arrive and how big is your family?

It's dubious you will be able to manage. It all depends. Accomodation in Geneva is hugely expensive. If you have a family then even more expensive and you will probably have to live outside Geneva and commute against the traffic or use public transport. And your wife may not be able to get work in Geneva due to the regulations.

There is a lot of good information in the forum from the past. Go through them and you will find out that 65K is probably not enough.
From your 65k, there will be the regular deductions etc so I think you might get around 4000CHF a month in your pocket which might be enough for one person but definitely not more. Does your wife speak French? You will have to depend on a second salary of your wife.

That will be VERY hard to manage without your wife working.

If you were single with no kids, it might be doable. Otherwise??

Wrong - the OP might be actually better off as his family would qualify for subsidised housing.

Wrong.


From experience 65k is enough for a person.

More like 4'700.

Which is exactly what the OP says...

Shorrick MK2....

My three kids went to private intl schools for 10 years. I know many many teachers who work in intl schools and the 65K is NOT enough for a couple.
Do not give false hope to OP and get him here. If he gets here based on your advice and does not make it, are you willing to compensate???

The OP's question was "Can a single person survive on a salary of XYZ - when my wife comes she will start working as well" - I would have thought as a well-heeled, high-placed executive (albeit in the aviation industry) you'd have been able to make sense of such a simple question.

Are you willing to compensate the OP if he chooses not to come based on your erroneus advice based on subpar question assessment?

If the Op chooses not to come, he will not need to be compensated. So I am off the hook

That will be VERY hard to manage without your wife working.

If you were single with no kids, it might be doable. Otherwise??

Housing will be the biggest expense by far - Geneva has ridiculous rental rates. As mentioned above, with a family you could qualify for a housing subsidy and tax breaks.

Will you have a relocation agent assisting you? My wife's company hired one for us and the agent helped us find a very comfortable apartment in a nice area of town at a very reasonable (for Geneva) rent.

A soon-to-be-transferred executive who had obtained a reasonably paid job in a Geneva bank, came to our house in Evian [France], fell in love with it and undertook steps for a private purchase - only to be told by said bank that she would be on 6 months initial trial before being taken on as permanent staff and that the regulations in Canton Geneva stipulated that the family had to live in the Canton during her trial period. Ergo, they could not buy our house and had to pay 3 times the amount for a much smaller apartment.
[Or perhaps they were telling us porkie pies having changed their mind, dunno]

I originated this thread. Thanks for all the responses. I understand that because I have a job offer my wife will automatically be able to work. She doesn't speak French although she is an experienced science teacher who could work at an international school, which we should try to arrange now. I'll come in Jan 2009 and my family will join during the summer. Would it be easy to get a small apt for such a short time? Some of you mentioned subsidized housing. That might be necessary if my family came before my wife found a job.

Subsidised housing is NOT for people comming into the country who don't have an automatic right to work here. Subsidised housing is for people who live here and have poor or no salaries.

it's not enough. you are getting low-balled. maybe if you are a young teacher with little or no experience, but even still, that's quite low. how old are you, how many years experience do you have, and what subject/level do you teach?

my wife is a teacher at an intl school and makes a LOT more than that. we've found that intl schools tend to lowball incoming teachers because 1) 65k here sounds a lot better than 40k or whatever they can make in the US 2) first-time teachers don't realize the cost of living here and 3) making 65k in switzerland probably sounds better than making the same in london, tokyo, or singapore. or some combination of the three.

it isn't enough.

Yes, with a family, living in Geneva, 65K is not enough. What else are they offering your? Like less health insurance for your and your family? Paid public transport? Are they helping you with relocating here?

however, if your wife got a similar paying job, you should be okay.

Hello leinbachj,

The Swiss Federal Statistics Office has recently launched a web query form which is linked to their salary survey database.

http://www.lohnrechner.bfs.admin.ch/Pages/SalariumWizard.aspx

Why don't you try it out

Unfortunately it is only available for the moment in FR,GE,IT.

However I calculated an example for you - University degree 5 years experience +Geneva (GE) etc and it came out at over 8.000 chf!

You might also try one of the unions here in Switzerland I don't know if for example Unia (www.unia.ch) have a branch for teachers

Anyway good luck

Regards

JohnC

I doubt it's enough for a whole family. Getting cheated. And don't forget, us Americans get to pay taxes to the US as well. Aren't we lucky.

When people told me how expensive it was to live here, I compared it to the expense of living in Manhatten. Almost all Americans I know are just shocked when they first get here. Groceries are 3-4 times as much. Taking your family of 4 to McDonald's? Be prepared to fork over about 50-70 francs.

Sorry, but with a family, no way would you cut it with that salary alone and be able to do anything remotely entertaining. Now, if your wife landed a job paying 80,000+. I might be singing you a different tune.

While that's true, you have to remember that the very large majority of teachers in Geneva are state employees and as such have a higher salary all things being equal than those being employed by private schools.