Avenir Suisse Freedom Index 2024

The figure above shows all cantons on the two axes of “economic” and “social” freedom. It shows that there is a negative correlation, if any, between the performance of the cantons in the two sub-indices. This can be seen more clearly if the outlier canton of Aargau is excluded. So if a canton is in the bottom half of both sub-indices, there is a high probability that it will even be in the bottom half overall – and the same naturally applies to the opposite scenario.

The fact that the cantons score higher on average in the economic freedom sub-index than in the social freedom sub-index could lead to the confirmation of a common cliché: “You see, Switzerland is economically liberal but socially conservative!”. Regardless of how one feels about this statement, it should be emphasized here that this cannot be read from this index. The values for economic freedoms tend to be higher than those for social freedoms because quantitative indicators dominate in the former. For the latter, the best canton (see methodology) automatically receives 100 points. In contrast, qualitative indicators dominate for social freedoms. Here, even the best cantons often do not fulfill all criteria and therefore do not achieve 100 points. This leads to lower scores on average.

Something else is striking in the figure: a strong cluster formation of the language regions. The six cantons that lie above the 45° line, i.e. the cantons in which social freedoms were rated better on average than economic freedoms, are all Latin-speaking – namely Vaud, Jura, Geneva, Neuchâtel, Fribourg and Ticino. Only the canton of Valais, which is also predominantly French-speaking, falls below this line. The clichéd characterization of German-speaking Switzerland as closer to the economy but less liberal in social terms is thus given new impetus here.

From this perspective, the negative correlation between the two types of freedom also disappears. This is not to be found within the language clusters. Greater social freedoms therefore do not necessarily come at the expense of fewer economic freedoms. This also means that the cantons can and should learn a lot from each other across language borders. For example, an attractive tax environment (more common in German-speaking Switzerland) does not prevent a canton from facilitating the political participation of resident foreigners (more common in French-speaking Switzerland).

An Excel document with all the details
This year, we have significantly increased the transparency of the Freedom Index. All data has now been prepared in a publicly accessible Excel document. This not only contains the index values and rankings of the cantons for all indicators, but also the actual values of the individual indicators. Some of these consist of several components. These are shown on another worksheet. Finally, the last worksheet contains a time series with the rankings of all cantons since 2009.

Freedom is ultimately always a subjective concept. Each individual may judge differently whether or not a law is perceived as an unnecessary restriction that restricts personal freedom of action. This is why the Avenir Suisse Freedom Index is designed to be interactive: In the “Index values” worksheet, each indicator can be individually selected and deselected (column D) in order to create a freedom index according to one’s own preferences. Only the selected indicators are considered in the average values for economic and social freedom. The “Ranks” worksheet thus adjusts automatically, as does the bubble chart of the 26 cantons and Liechtenstein on the first two worksheets.

In the “Historical rankings” worksheet, you will also find an interactive chart with time series for all rankings. Simply select the canton(s) and the freedom category for which you want to see the development of the rankings.

New methodology for indexing
In order to make the indexing of the values more comprehensible and easier to interpret, the methodology was comprehensively adapted:

For the quantitative indicators, the canton with the best value receives an index value of 100 points, while the canton with the worst value receives 0 points. For the qualitative indicators, an index value of 100 results if a canton fully meets all criteria. A minimum of 0 points and a maximum of 100 points can therefore be achieved for each indicator. This also applies to the two sub-indices on economic and social freedom, which represent an arithmetic mean of the associated indicators.

This approach differs from the previous one: Until 2023, the average of all cantons was set at 50 points and the score achieved by a canton depended on how many standard deviations it was next to this average. This was mathematically plausible, but not very intuitive, as it was quite possible that the lowest index value for an indicator would be 40 points, for example, or conversely that a canton would only achieve 65 points for another indicator even though it met all the criteria. The new, consistent 0-100 scale means a stretching, especially for qualitative indicators with few gradations. This means that the same differences are reflected more strongly than before in the respective sub-index, which can lead to certain shifts in rank.

Contact:
Lukas Rühli
Senior Fellow, Head of Research Smart Government
+41 44 445 90 07
lukas.ruehli@avenir-suisse.ch

--- END press release Avenir Suisse Freedom Index 2024 ---

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