I spent the first 7 months of 2007 working in USA, and the last 5 as a graduate student at ETH. I am payed a "scholarship" by ETH disbursed monthly.

If anyone has been through something similar or otherwise knows any answers to the questions below, I would greatly appreciate it!
1) When filing my US income tax, do I need to include income made and spent in switzerland? If so, does a scholarship count as income that must be reported?
2) Do I need to file swiss income taxes (if such a thing exist)? If so, will ETH send me some sort of document (such as the W-2 in USA) that I can use as a starting point towards filing taxes?

Thanks,
Patrick

To your questions:

1.) If you are US YES. You have to report your Swiss income to US taxes.
2.) Yes you have to report your income to Swiss taxes.

I have had clients they did not report to US and got big troubles once they returned home. US people always pay taxes twice. First in the country they live in and second to USA. Sorry,... its your damn law.

If you need to know more I could give you contacts. Either to professionals or companies dealing with this or for a first step to Americans who live here since a long time....

Check this IRS FAQ and, if you have more questions, the publications it links to.

There is also a tax agreement between Switzerland and the US on the IRS website. I've posted the link a number of times on the forum, so it should turn up if you do a search on IRS.

Addressing Double Taxation (for Americans): American Competiveness Act

Yes you pay taxes twice. But not double taxation really as you get credit for your Swiss taxes, plus you can get a pretty large exemption as long as you don't spend too much time in the US in a tax year.

Regarding Swiss, won't the employer withhold (don't know his salary level) and he might not have to file in CH?