What households offer a cleaner: CHF 30 in German-speaking Switzerland, rich municipality or not

Three prices: 25, 30 and 35 francs

The offers do not spread across a range; they pile up on round amounts. 81% of ads that state a rate offer exactly 25, 30 or 35 francs an hour. The median across Switzerland is CHF 29, the average CHF 28.30. 99 ads (5.4%) offer CHF 20 or less, below the CHF 20.35 minimum wage for unskilled staff in the federal standard employment contract for domestic work. That contract only applies from five hours a week with the same household, however, and not in Geneva; 46 of the 66 ads that state the hours look for someone for less than five hours.

Rich municipalities offer barely more

Clino matched every ad with the average net income of the municipality where the household lives (Federal Tax Administration, tax year 2022) and split the ads into five equal groups. To keep the language border from skewing the result, the chart shows German-speaking Switzerland only. The median is CHF 30 in all five groups. On average the richest fifth offers CHF 29.70, the poorest CHF 28.20: a difference of 1.50 francs, although the average income in the richest fifth’s municipalities is about three quarters higher. The picture is not entirely flat: in the richest fifth two thirds of ads offer CHF 30 or more, in the poorest just over half.

Differences between the municipalities with the most ads are small too. Rapperswil-Jona comes first with a median of CHF 35, Lugano last with CHF 25. The city of Zurich, at CHF 30, is level with Schlieren, Bern and Winterthur.

Geneva and Ticino often offer exactly the cantonal minimum wage

The big divide runs along the language border. The median is CHF 30 in German-speaking Switzerland, CHF 25 in French-speaking Switzerland (average CHF 26.64) and CHF 25 in Ticino (average CHF 24.37). That household wages are lower in western Switzerland and Ticino is known from wage data. What is new is how closely the offers track the legal minimum.

At CHF 24.59, Geneva has the highest cantonal minimum wage in Switzerland, and in private households it applies from the first hour. Geneva’s standard employment contract for domestic work («CTT-EDom») sets the same amount for unskilled staff, CHF 24.85 with four years’ experience or a vocational certificate and CHF 25.11 with a full apprenticeship. 50 of 59 ads in Geneva offer exactly CHF 25, 3 offer less than CHF 24.59. The ads do not say whether holiday and public-holiday pay comes on top. According to the canton, for hourly pay it is added to the minimum wage; for four weeks of holiday that is 8.33%. If the CHF 25 included holiday pay, the basic wage would be CHF 23.08, below the minimum.

In Ticino 23 of 73 ads offer exactly CHF 20, none less. That is the cantonal minimum wage for private households (CHF 20.00), which applies from the first hour. From five hours a week the higher federal standard contract with CHF 20.35 applies; most ads do not say how many hours the job involves.

English only pays in childcare

Households that look for a cleaner in English do not offer more. Compared with ads in German, French and Italian in the same canton, the difference is −0.13 francs an hour. Even in the canton of Zurich, where most English ads come from, the median is CHF 30 in both languages.

Childcare is different. Families who write their ad for a babysitter, nanny or childminder in English offer CHF 23.39 an hour on average, families with an ad in German CHF 20.36. Part of that is Zurich, where most English ads come from. Compared within the same canton, a premium of CHF 2.64 remains. One likely explanation: families who advertise in English often want someone who speaks English with the child. In cleaning, language hardly matters for the work itself.

Origin: rarely asked for, but not never

Clino read and coded by hand every ad that mentions a nationality, an origin, a native language or a permit. In cleaning, 2 of 2,844 ads ask for a particular nationality or origin; in childcare, 5 of 2,410. Asking for a work permit or residence in Switzerland is more common (6 and 7 ads). The nationalities named are mostly Swiss, or a country whose language the family is looking for, such as Brazil for Portuguese. One ad asks for particular nationalities with no link to a language.

Legally these are not the same thing. According to the federal legal guide on racial discrimination, an ad that excludes people because of their ethnicity, religion or skin colour breaches the anti-racism provision of the Criminal Code (Art. 261bis), and excluding EU and EFTA nationals breaches the Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons. Private employers may, however, distinguish by residence status and require a work permit. Whether a wish for a particular nationality is allowed in a private household is disputed; there is no case law yet. Clino does not assess or quote individual ads.

Families look for Portuguese, Russian, Spanish

In childcare, 50 of 304 ads name a language the carer should speak. English is the most frequent. But 27 ads ask for a language that is neither a national language nor English, usually the parents’ own language: Portuguese, Spanish, Russian, Arabic, Hungarian, Turkish and others. These families offer CHF 20.48 an hour on average, families with no language wish CHF 20.74. A family language is a wish, not a pay premium.

Registration is hardly mentioned in the ads

17 of 2,844 ads for a cleaner say that the household will register the worker, pay AHV contributions or offer an employment contract. 7 ask the cleaner to settle her own contributions as self-employed, which generally does not work in a private household: someone who cleans for a household counts as an employee for the AHV. Cash in hand or work without registration is offered in no ad. The platform shows only the first 300 or so characters of each ad; anything after that is not covered. In childcare, 1 of 2,410 ads mentions registration, and none of the 304 ads whose full text is readable. Babysitters up to the age of 25 have an AHV exemption of CHF 750 a year per household; above that, a babysitter’s pay must be declared too.

What cleaners ask for

Cleaners also present themselves on the same platforms with a profile and their hourly rate. In a sample of 672 recently active profiles the median is CHF 30, the average CHF 28.93. Households offer a median of CHF 29. Nationally, asks and offers are therefore close, but not in the canton of Zurich: there cleaners ask a median of CHF 35 (76 profiles) and households offer CHF 30. In Geneva and Ticino both sit at CHF 25. The profile sample is sorted by last login and not representative of all cleaners.

What families can take from this