Switzerland: nothing but cuckoo clocks?

For years, prosperous and peaceful Switzerland has been underappreciated. Being small and successful, frankly, is boring to many people.

Consider the Cold War spy movie “The Third Man.” In a famous scene, the shady character played by Orson Welles observes, “In Italy, for 30 years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder, bloodshed—they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love; they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.” To add insult to slur, the cuckoo clock is actually from Germany.

Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew, the founding leader of another economic success story, has told associates he modeled his policies after those of Switzerland minus its reluctance to interfere in the daily lives of its citizens and the accountability of its direct democracy. More...

See also this and this...