A nanny in Switzerland can build a life. A nanny in Spain often cannot.
En un continente donde el trabajo digno escasea para quienes superan los cincuenta años, Rosana, una española de 60 años, encontró en Suiza lo que España no pudo ofrecerle: un salario que convierte la experiencia acumulada en independencia real. Su trayectoria por Irlanda, Inglaterra, Alemania y finalmente Suiza no es la historia de una excepción afortunada, sino el reflejo de una brecha estructural que empuja a más de 139.000 españoles a buscar en la economía helvética la estabilidad que sus propios mercados laborales no garantizan. La pregunta que su historia deja suspendida no es por qué se fue, sino por qué tantos no pueden quedarse.
- A los 60 años, con décadas de experiencia en cuidado infantil, Rosana enfrentó un mercado laboral español que no tenía lugar para ella ni para su trayectoria.
- El contraste fue inmediato y contundente: en cinco meses en Suiza ahorró lo suficiente para alquilar su propio apartamento, algo que en España habría tardado años en lograr.
- No todo fue sencillo: una empleadora difícil, jornadas de doce horas y tareas domésticas no pactadas pusieron a prueba su capacidad de adaptación antes de que encontrara el encaje correcto.
- Hoy trabaja tres días y medio a la semana, vive junto a un lago en un pequeño pueblo y dispone del resto del tiempo para sí misma, una ecuación que Suiza hace posible y España raramente ofrece.
- Su caso no es singular: 139.255 ciudadanos españoles residen ya en Suiza, muchos de ellos mayores, que han elegido la estabilidad económica sobre la proximidad al hogar.
Suiza paga lo que España no puede, o no quiere, pagar. Con un salario mensual medio que ronda los 7.489 euros incluso para trabajos sin titulación formal, el país centroeuropeo representa para muchos trabajadores españoles una aritmética que resulta imposible ignorar. Rosana lo entendió a los 60 años, cuando las opciones en casa se estrechaban y la experiencia acumulada durante décadas parecía no tener precio en el mercado doméstico.
No llegó a Suiza sin bagaje. Había trabajado en Irlanda, Inglaterra, Alemania y España, aprendiendo en cada país no solo a cuidar niños sino a leer las necesidades no dichas de cada familia, a adaptarse sin perder su propio eje. Cuando cruzó la frontera suiza, llevaba ese conocimiento como capital.
Su primer contrato duró dos años. Cuidó a una niña desde los siete meses, vivió con la familia y asumió también tareas del hogar que no esperaba. La sorpresa llegó con el sueldo: en cinco meses había ahorrado lo suficiente para independizarse. Cuando la niña empezó el colegio, Rosana regresó a España. España no le ofreció nada. Volvió a Suiza en pocos meses.
El segundo empleo fue más exigente: doce horas diarias, dos hijos, una madre tensa. Pero el trabajo con los niños era puro, sin tareas domésticas, solo parques, música y la arquitectura sencilla del día de un niño. Lo dejó cuando la tensión familiar se volvió insostenible, no porque el trabajo la hubiera defraudado.
El tercer empleo se convirtió en el definitivo. Una pareja anglófona, tres hijos, un ritmo que por fin encajaba. Ahora trabaja tres días y medio a la semana, vive en un pueblo junto a un lago que describe con algo parecido a la gratitud, y tiene el resto del tiempo para ella. Lo que su historia muestra no es un golpe de suerte, sino una diferencia estructural: en Suiza, una cuidadora puede construir una vida. En España, a menudo no puede. La diferencia no está en el esfuerzo. Está en el mercado.
Switzerland's wages tell a story that Spain's job market cannot match. In 2024, the average monthly salary in Switzerland hovered around 7,489 euros—and that figure includes work that requires no formal qualification, no degree, no credential beyond competence and reliability. For a 60-year-old woman watching her options narrow at home, the arithmetic became impossible to ignore.
Rosana made her move to Switzerland as a nanny, but she did not arrive as a novice. For decades, she had moved through Europe—Ireland, England, Germany, Spain—learning the rhythms of different families, different approaches to raising children, different ways of understanding what care actually means. Each country taught her something: not just how to manage a household or soothe a crying infant, but how to read a family's unspoken needs, how to adapt without losing herself. By the time she crossed into Switzerland at 60, she carried that accumulated knowledge like currency.
Her first contract lasted two years. She arrived to care for a seven-month-old girl and moved into the family home, as she had done before in other countries. The work was familiar. The shock came in the paycheck. Within five months, she had saved enough to rent her own apartment. She was covering all her expenses and still setting money aside each month—a feat that would have taken years in Spain. The job demanded 36 hours a week and included housework alongside childcare, tasks she had not expected to perform but accepted as the price of entry. When the family's needs shifted and the girl started school, Rosana chose not to hunt for a second job to fill the hours. She went home.
But Spain offered nothing. The absence of work pulled her back to Switzerland within months. This second stint was different: she worked twelve-hour days for a family with two children, one small and one on the way. The mother was difficult, the hours were long, but the work itself was pure—no cleaning, no domestic tasks, just children and their world. Parks, the zoo, music lessons, the simple architecture of a child's day. She left because the family's tension had become unbearable, not because the work had failed her.
The third placement became permanent in the way that matters. A couple who spoke English, three children, and a rhythm that finally fit. Rosana now works three and a half days a week. She folds clothes, organizes rooms, prepares dinners, reads stories, plays in parks. The rest of the week is hers. She lives in a small village beside a lake that she describes as having something almost magical about it—mornings that begin quietly, evenings that end the same way, a steadiness she had not found elsewhere.
What Rosana's story reveals is not exceptional. According to 2025 data, 139,255 Spanish citizens now live in Switzerland. They are not all young people chasing their first break. Many are older, approaching or past conventional retirement age, making the calculation that a stable economy and a livable wage matter more than staying put. Switzerland's wages are not a secret; they are simply real in a way that Spanish salaries, for many workers, are not. A nanny in Switzerland can build a life. A nanny in Spain often cannot. The difference is not ambition or work ethic. It is the market itself.
Citações Notáveis
She describes her village by the lake as having something almost magical about it—mornings that begin quietly, evenings that end the same way.— Rosana, on her life in Switzerland
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
Why did Rosana wait until 60 to make this move? She had decades of experience before that.
She was building something first—testing herself across different countries, learning how to adapt. By 60, she wasn't starting from scratch. She was cashing in on what she'd already learned.
But leaving Spain at that age seems risky. What if the Swiss job hadn't worked out?
It would have been risky if she were untested. But she'd already lived abroad multiple times. She knew she could survive in a foreign place. The real risk was staying in Spain where the work didn't pay enough to live on.
The article mentions she left her first two Swiss jobs. Doesn't that suggest instability?
Not really. She left the first because the family's needs changed and she didn't want to scramble for a second job. She left the second because the mother was difficult—that's about fit, not failure. By the third placement, she found what worked.
What's the actual difference between earning 7,489 euros in Switzerland versus what she might make in Spain?
It's not just the number. It's what that number lets you do. In Switzerland, she could rent her own place within five months and still save. In Spain, that timeline stretches to years, if it happens at all. The wage isn't just higher—it's transformative.
Does she seem happy now, or just financially secure?
Both. She works three and a half days a week and has time for herself. She lives by a lake in a quiet village. Financial security is part of it, but so is the rhythm of her days. She's not just surviving anymore.
What does this say about Spain's economy?
That it's not keeping people. Not just young people—people in their sixties with decades of expertise are looking elsewhere because the wages don't justify staying. That's a quiet crisis.