CH appeals most to rich and upper-middle class foreign tourists, but I distinguish between “visitor” from “foreigner living there”.
In terms of the latter group, I don’t think CH attempts to appeal: practically all paperwork is in local language with no attempt at furnishing anything in the language of my mother tongue. Further, your immigration status factors into contracts: subscriptions (telephony), rental agreement, etc. We were once turned down for an apartment because of it. Throughout my time abroad, a common trend is that expats (note: first use of that word) don’t bother to learn local language and are typically unhappy. Those that do attempt to are far happier. Does a host country afford and coddling for the former? I’ve never seen evidence of that no matter how rich. Is it hostile? No.
The story could be different for the super rich who live there like Tina Turner and former Yukos Mikhail Khodorkovsky, but that is not the circumstances of our family nor any other family we know by a long-measure. Citizenship cannot be bought here either. I think for a few million it is purchaseable in Austria or Hungary.
But at the end of the day, in my top-level reply, I had stated “at the moment.” We have lived elsewhere in the world, and the assessment of the overall problems the U.S. are facing would have been identical. The decline is palpable.
In Switzerland, that's no longer going to be an option. They recently implemented a change that requires you to learn at least A1 level (super basic) German in order to keep your B-permit.
As a recent arrival on a B-permit, I think it's a good idea.
- Allow time-based naturalization outside of marriage?
- Allow dual or more citizenship?
CH is on the more restrictive end, but it is one of the few European countries to allow either of the above. If you compare outcomes and hurdles, the U.S. has been more restrictive to foreigners coming in than CH (don’t believe me; tell that the the Canadians I know who moved to CH instead of working for U.S. branches due to U.S. not issuing family reunification visa).
So the question to ask: what do you want? Permit to enter, live, and work; permanent residency; citizenship? Each of these things are different.
If you're an EU citizen you have the right to live there no questions asked.
If you're not EU, you can live there to pursue gainful employment so long as your employer can show that you have skills they can't obtain from within Switzerland or the EU.
If you can get a job, you'll be given either an L permit, which is "temporary" but can be exchanged for a B permit after 2 years, which can then be renewed indefinitely. After 5 years, if you can demonstrate integration (criteria vary by canton), you can get a C permit, which is permanent (essentially a green card).
As a skilled worker, I actually found Switzerland to be substantially more friendly than the US, though a lot of the hard work was handled by my employer.
Due to bilateral treaties, immigration from EU countries is quite easy nowadays, but for citizens of non-EU countries, far less so. Almost 90% of resident foreigners are European: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Switzerland
It was super easy for me to get a working visa to Switzerland when I had a job there, and I’m not EU. Anecdata for sure, but I was hardly the only non-European around. There were even plenty of war and economic refugees around, far more than I ever encountered in the states.
We speak one of the languages, know enough of the culture and politics, etc. to be inconspicuous and blend into the crowd. More than that, the culture and people and country have grown on us tremendously. :-)