Remittance Outflows from Switzerland

This paper examines the structure of remittances originating from Switzerland. We find that while Switzerland is reported to be the third largest source of remittances worldwide, the vast majority of these outflows are wages earned by non-resident commuters from France, Italy and Germany. We further estimate that two-thirds of the remittances made by immigrants resident in Switzerland flow to European countries with high per capita income. These findings suggest that the development impact of remittance outflows from Switzerland is negligible compared to that of other major source countries.