It’s very relevant because you have to pay it each year and I need to know what percentage of my income it is. esp. when taxes become greater than income less other expenses!
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When you write “taxable income”, does that ignore income from capital gains which isn’t taxed in Switzerland? If yes, I do think those need to be taken into account for a “total taxes” calculation involving wealth taxes (because other places may not have wealth tax but many would tax capital gains).
Taking a very rough 2% distribution rate for a mix of stocks and bonds, that’d mean half of income would come from selling assets (to reach a 4% withdrawal rate) so the gross income would be 226k and your computed total tax rate (including wealth tax computed against income) would be half of the 99%, or 45.5%.
Are there UK taxes involved on top of that that I failed to account for?
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Ah. I see what you mean. On that basis it would be 48%-55%.
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It‘s one of the fairest systems on the planet, in my opinion. At least in the german speaking cantons.
Vaud taxes, especially on wealth and stuff are a bit over the top.
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Main tax advantages for Swiss resident early-retirees (maybe I missed some…):
- No capital gains tax for buy and hold investors
- Interest expense is deductible from taxable income
- Tax sheltered 2 Pillar Vested Benefits & 3 Pillar accounts with reduced rate for withdrawals. Can be invested in equities
- Depending on the canton, no (or relatively low) inheritance tax to direct line descendants
Disadvantages:
- Existence of wealth tax ( ~1% p.a. tax in Geneva or Vaud means that to preserve wealth a return on wealth of 2% p.a. is needed just to keep up with inflation)
- High purchase taxes on real estate (in some cantons like Geneva; apparently not the case in Zurich)
- Tax levied on hypothetical rent (again Geneva seems to be more painful than other cantons)
Answering the original post: tax rules favour equities with low dividend payouts (growth stocks & quality stocks), living off capital gains instead of dividends, and leverage.
Cash, bonds and dividend stocks are generally less favourable tax wise
If bouclier fiscal becomes applicable the incentives are more pronounced. In Geneva an effective 70-80% marginal tax rate could apply to dividend income, with similar tax relief on interest expense
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Seems like not living in Geneva is the move 
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I am not an expert but with the current bouclier fiscal rules it may not need to be terrible if assets are chosen sensibly
Taking an extreme example of someone lucky enough to have 10M CHF wealth, the link posted above suggested 94k CHF wealth tax, or ~1% of wealth, before counting income tax.
If the 10M CHF is invested in quality equities (for example) having 1% dividend yield then in theory total taxes would be capped at ~80k after application of the bouclier fiscal.
Likely it is not worthwhile for such a person to move canton to optimise tax.
The people who lose out in the system in comparison to other countries are retirees with all their wealth in their property and no debt
The downside is that one is penalised for owning one’s property and assets which are often considered as “safe” in other countries (savings accounts and bonds)
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