ZURICH. I would rather Switzerland argue about the heating bill than pretend that 1.5 per cent is a wage spiral. The Federal Statistical Office reported on Tuesday that consumer prices rose 1.5 per cent in the year to October. That is the highest reading in almost three years, it beat forecasts, and it sits above the National Bank’s 1.2 per cent sketch for this quarter. It is also, on the same release, a fuel story with a quiet core. Take petroleum products out and prices were flat on the month.
Core inflation, excluding fresh food, energy and fuel, is 0.5 per cent. Domestic prices are up 0.8 per cent on the year. Imported prices are up 3.7 per cent, and the import line is where oil lives. The National Bank’s definition of stability, zero to 2 per cent, still holds the headline. A central bank that raised rates in a hurry because heating oil spiked would be answering the wrong shock. The policy rate is zero. The next assessment is in December. Nothing published at 08:30 requires a surprise before then.
The number underneath the number
None of that makes the headline harmless. A household ordering oil this week does not experience “core inflation”. It experiences a line that is about 40 per cent higher than a year ago, with heating oil up almost 10 per cent in a single month. Shoes cost more. A hospital outpatient visit costs more. A hotel and a package holiday cost less, which is a poor consolation in November. The honest description is a split economy: calm in most of the basket, sharp in the part that heats the house and moves the car.
The franc does not rescue the argument either way. October was a strong month for the currency against the euro, which would normally lean against import prices. The index rose anyway, because oil rose more. Commentators who spent September warning about a weak franc, and commentators who spent Monday cheering a strong one, are both late for this print. The driver is in the energy table.
What Bern should argue about instead
The political files that match the pain are already on the table. Voters decide on 29 November whether a VAT rise of 0.4 of a point, from 2028, will help fund the 13th old-age pension. The pension itself is going out in December, to about 2.6 million people, whether the tax vote passes or not. That is a real argument about who pays. A performative panic about 1.5 per cent is not. Nor is a claim that underlying Swiss prices have suddenly come untied. They have not. The office’s own core rate says so.
I want the National Bank to keep saying what the tables say: temporary pressure from energy, a low core, a target band that still contains the headline. I want parliament and the parties to talk about the winter bill, and about a pension promise whose funding the country has not yet approved. The 1.5 per cent figure is worth reading carefully. It is not worth misreading on purpose. Dear fuel is a problem. Calling it a spiral is a way of not dealing with the problem you actually have.