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According to a study, wages are rising in the catering industry, for example. But things are looking bad in health and social services.
The more difficult it is to find good staff, the more wages rise. Daniel Kopp, labor market economist at ETH Zurich, proves this connection in his new study. “Companies that cannot find employees must become more attractive so that more people want to work for them.”
According to the survey, wages in the catering trade will rise by almost four percent. But not in health and social services, although there is a greater shortage of workers. That could lead to a vicious circle, says Kopp: “The pressure on those who are left is increasing, and more people are getting out.”
Lack of staff in day care centers
This is exactly what Corinne Ruch experiences in the Margarethenpark daycare center in Basel. She was only able to fill one of four vacancies. “This increases the already high burden for the rest of the workforce,” says Ruch. They are currently struggling with many cases of illness.
The profession is no longer as popular as it used to be. This is also due to the heavy workload and the low wages: After the apprenticeship, supervisors in Basel earn just 4,300 francs. The wages then increase, but many apprentices would not stay in the profession.
The problem exists in all 35 Basel daycare centers of the Familea association, says manager Monika Bitterli. “We can only keep to the personnel key with great difficulty.” The demand for daycare places is huge, the occupancy rate is correspondingly high, which increases the burden on the caregivers even more.
Little room for maneuver in prices
Actually, one would have to create more daycare places, says Bitterli. But better working conditions are urgently needed. Bitterli would also like to improve this – but she has little leeway: In Basel, the canton specifies the maximum cost of a daycare place, how many staff with which training are responsible for a group of children and also how much this staff can earn has. Politicians therefore provide the business framework.
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There is an acute shortage of staff, especially in day-care centers. But the wage screw is not being turned.
Keystone/DPA/Marijan Murat
Day care centers are not regulated to the same extent in all cantons. But the same applies everywhere: politics has a significant influence, at least indirectly via subsidies, on how much money the daycare centers get for a daycare place. And parents in Switzerland are already paying a lot for a place in a daycare center by international comparison, so the pricing leeway for daycare center operators is correspondingly narrow.
And that is exactly what applies not only to daycare centers, but to a large part of the health and social system: the bosses operate in a heavily regulated field in which they cannot set prices freely. According to a survey by the ETH, this scope is greater in gastronomy, for example.
A societal issue
For Daniel Kopp from the ETH, society must ask itself how much it values high-quality childcare and health care. “If we want good staff, then we have to provide the means to pay higher wages and improve working conditions.” Otherwise people worked elsewhere.
When it comes to childcare, the discussion is particularly piquant: because not only parents, but also the economy depends on good childcare. Because if these parents look after their children themselves, the economy lacks them as skilled workers.