I thought Switzerland was part of the single market. Doesn't that mean they don't make their own trade deals, or have I misunderstood?
this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2025
27 points (96.6% liked)
Europe
8144 readers
557 users here now
News and information from Europe 🇪🇺
(Current banner: La Mancha, Spain. Feel free to post submissions for banner images.)
Rules (2024-08-30)
- This is an English-language community. Comments should be in English. Posts can link to non-English news sources when providing a full-text translation in the post description. Automated translations are fine, as long as they don't overly distort the content.
- No links to misinformation or commercial advertising. When you post outdated/historic articles, add the year of publication to the post title. Infographics must include a source and a year of creation; if possible, also provide a link to the source.
- Be kind to each other, and argue in good faith. Don't post direct insults nor disrespectful and condescending comments. Don't troll nor incite hatred. Don't look for novel argumentation strategies at Wikipedia's List of fallacies.
- No bigotry, sexism, racism, antisemitism, islamophobia, dehumanization of minorities, or glorification of National Socialism. We follow German law; don't question the statehood of Israel.
- Be the signal, not the noise: Strive to post insightful comments. Add "/s" when you're being sarcastic (and don't use it to break rule no. 3).
- If you link to paywalled information, please provide also a link to a freely available archived version. Alternatively, try to find a different source.
- Light-hearted content, memes, and posts about your European everyday belong in other communities.
- Don't evade bans. If we notice ban evasion, that will result in a permanent ban for all the accounts we can associate with you.
- No posts linking to speculative reporting about ongoing events with unclear backgrounds. Please wait at least 12 hours. (E.g., do not post breathless reporting on an ongoing terror attack.)
- Always provide context with posts: Don't post uncontextualized images or videos, and don't start discussions without giving some context first.
(This list may get expanded as necessary.)
Posts that link to the following sources will be removed
- on any topic: Al Mayadeen, brusselssignal:eu, citjourno:com, europesays:com, Breitbart, Daily Caller, Fox, GB News, geo-trends:eu, news-pravda:com, OAN, RT, sociable:co, any AI slop sites (when in doubt please look for a credible imprint/about page), change:org (for privacy reasons)
- on Middle-East topics: Al Jazeera
- on Hungary: Euronews
Unless they're the only sources, please also avoid The Sun, Daily Mail, any "thinktank" type organization, and non-Lemmy social media (incl. Substack). Don't link to Twitter directly, instead use xcancel.com. For Reddit, use old:reddit:com
(Lists may get expanded as necessary.)
Ban lengths, etc.
We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.
If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 7 or 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.
If you want to protest a removal or ban, feel free to write privately to the primary mod account @EuroMod@feddit.org
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
Switzerland is not part of the EU nor the single market.
We also do not have a single person in charge of the government and our government does not really visit other countries for neutrality reasons. Trump got to talk with one of the women in our government only, found out she’s not the boss of Switzerland (because there is no such thing) and then punished us with 39% tariffs.
The tariff number might actually be a lot simpler and a lot stupider than that. The tariffs were calculated by literally just scaling it directly to the trade balance between the US and the other country. The US has a higher trade deficit proportional to the total value of trade with Switzerland than it does with the EU
This calculation is how some of the poorest countries in the world got hit with some of the highest tariffs. Of course the US has a huge proportional trade deficit with, say, Madagascar; Madagascar cannot afford to buy American goods
I can afford to buy American goods and I bought a shit ton in the past, I chose not to buy anything American anymore back in March and am still standing strong.
I haven’t even used google in months.
I'm aware it's not part of the EU, but I thought that it was part of the EEA? It's part of Schengen, so it does participate in at least some of the EU treaties.
We’re part of Schengen, but not the single market.
According to this link, Switzerland is partially integrated with the single market...
We have a bunch of bilateral trade agreements with the EU - but as far as international trade is concerned we are not part of the single market at all.
Which is why Trump imposed 39% import tariffs on Swiss goods, while EU goods are “only” tariffed 10%.
When you cross the border from France, Austria, Italy or Germany into Switzerland you do not have to show a passport, but you have to declare all goods if you cross the 150 CHF threshold for personal imports.
As several NGOs have been saying for years:
Whenever faced with criticism of its closer economic ties with the People’s Republic of China, the Swiss government always points to the human rights dialogue between the two countries, in which sensitive topics are allegedly also discussed. This dialogue takes place behind closed doors though, so it is not publicly known what exactly gets talked about ...
Since Xi Jinping was appointed General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in 2012, the situation has deteriorated dramatically for Tibetans and Uyghurs in China ...