Switzerland's legendary workforce is highly productive, multilingual, and one of the most multinational in Europe. More than 20% of the population comes from abroad, bringing invaluable know how to the already large labor pool.

The Swiss work the most hours per week in Europe; Swiss labor law is among the most liberal in Europe, and social costs are among the lowest in Europe.

Switzerland took first place in a Financial Times analysis of an OECD study on countries' abilities to exploit the expanding "knowledge intensive industries" of the 21st century.

Switzerland came in 9th, 5th in Europe, in the 2003 Global Information Technology-Economy Index (GITEI) ranking 48 nations on their embracing the technological revolution as an important part of their economic development.

According to the IDC/World Times Information Society Index for 2004 Switzerland ranks 4th globally and 3rd in Europe among 52 countries in a measure of the state of information technology usage and adoption.