Capitalism in one country? Switzerland in the international economy

Bibliographic Data

ID6272001
AuthorsPeter J Katzenstein (corresponding author)
Year1980
Volume34
Issue4
Pages507-540
Publication date1980-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInternational Organization (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0020-8183 • E-ISSN: 1531-5088
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s002081830001883x
OpenAlexW2166742622
LanguageEN
Citations received19
References cited14

Recent experience confirms an old truth: Switzerland offers a view of the past that works. In 1978 Switzerland was one of the richest countries in the world with a Gross National Product (GNP) of $13,853 per capita. Between 1975 and 1978 it raised the proportion of exports of goods and services in its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) from 36 to 44 percent. In 1977 its current account surplus surpassed that of West Germany and was second only to Japan's. Between 1970 and the end of 1979 the Swiss Franc appreciated by about 90 percent on a trade-weighted basis; against the dollar the appreciation was about 120 percent. From a rate of more than 10 percent in 1974 its inflation rate dropped to 1 percent in 1978. Switzerland's official unemployment figures (which do not record the loss of more than 300,000 jobs among foreign workers and women since 1973) are lower than those of all other advanced industrial states. And even though since 1970 government expenditures have increased faster than in any other OECD country, Switzerland's budget deficit was cut by one-third in the midst of a general recession in 1976–1977. Real GDP dropped by more than 7 percent in 1975, which represented one of the largest declines in the OECD and was a much greater drop than had been recorded in any one year in the 1930s; yet, only two years later, in 1977 Switzerland's real GNP increased by 4.3 percent, which exceeded the growth rate of any other OECD member state

Current account · Demographic economics · Economic growth · Economics · Economy · Exchange rate · Goods and services · Gross domestic product · Inflation (cosmology · International economics · Liberian dollar · Macroeconomics · Monetary economics · Per capita · Product (mathematics · Real gross domestic product · Real wages · Recession · Unemployment · Demography · Global Financial Crisis and Policies · Political Economy and Marxism · Social Policy and Reform Studies

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