Dear friends of Switzerland, I am coming soon to a PhD in Physics in University of Geneva (Application in Process). Can I know what are the salaries of PhD students are like?? The website is mostly in French and I have yet to understand the kind of funding one gets. From browsing the forum, I understand different Universities has a different salaries base. Any from Physics PhD of Uni Geneva? Thanks!

About CHF 3'000 give or take a few.

Some threads discussing this before:

Average pay for postdoc/new lecturer?
PhD salary???
University student in Zurich

I have a friend starting there and she's getting 46000CHF

If you are coming over already, I would assume you already have a contract with a defined salary?

Personally, I wouldn't have left home without my signed contract.

Unfortunately, I am going to be offered the contract and I am wondering if there are some negotiations before finalizing the contract?? I am not sure but I heard it was around 3000CHF for Science.. I am checking out Physics Specific.... Is it for sure ETH or EPFL will have higher allowance? THanks for the reply.

Thanks, your friend is a Physics PhD student?

I havn't heard of negotiations before--but that doesn't mean you can't try.
At the ETH most I've heard receive about 3000 (at 60% of a full salary) in for their first year.
I guess it is possible to negotiate the percentage of full salary.

Not sure what the deal is at EPFL

She's a biology student

Not really, if you are coming as a PhD student. Postdocs and lecturers can negotiate to some extent, but beginning PhD students are essentially interchangeable. If you don't take their offer they will simply move on to the next bright young thing.

Have you already been accepted? As others have said, don't leave home till you get a contract to sign.

I don't know whether salaries are higher at ETH or EPFL - but have you been accepted to both? If not, what does it matter?

I don't know what you mean by this, especially assuming you have already gone through the linked threads above. In short, No, it is NOT for sure; it "depends".

For federal institutes like ETH and EPFL, the reference salary is just under 64k and 84 k respectively for phds and post docs, for the first year (I am talking of Jan 2009 and beyond).

The position offered can range from 60% to 100% i.e. what percentage of the reference salary you will be paid . It is less common for phds to be at 100% than for post docs. And what you get in hand depends on your tax rate, which in turn depends on where you live, marital status etc.

So you now know the band of salaries with which to compare your offered salary. (other universities may not follow the exact scales, but near it. E.g Univ. Zurich has an almost identical salary for a 100% position).

Whether Phd/post doc salaries are/should be negotiable is a moot question and you will hear conflicting answers. Negotiation is quite normal in some departments, and can be based on factors like marital status, prior work, potential value to the department, whether you will be working mostly independently or under close supervision, and a host of other factors.

That apart, I think phd is part of education, and so long as your salary is sufficient to cover a basic living cost you should be happy.

All the best

Edit: agree with Mathnut; Phds do not (and should not) have as much room for salary negotiation as post docs and lecturers

That's for sure! And it may also depend on your citizenship/residency status. I'm not sure what the federal rules are, but at least in canton Zürich there is a special restriction for non-EUs on student B permits (not allowed to be employed more than 60%, if I remember right.)

I don't believe this is true. I know some PhDs earning 100% at UniZ (to be competitive with ETH and due to their field) and we earned 80% in my group at ETH.

But anways, it doesn't really matter for the OP. They should just ask their professor or his/her secretary what the salary will be. That is something we won't know. Find it weird they wouldn't do that anyways, as I wouldn't accept a job without knowing the salary as stated by the employer.

Just checked with a colleague and you're right - it was a restriction imposed by a particular funding source, not by the canton.