Canton's population rises to 125,421

Latest statistics show that the population of the canton rose to 125,421 over the course of 2017, up by 1,473 or 1.2 per cent on the previous year.

The statistics also reveal that Zug is the canton with the highest level of population growth in the country, a result of immigration from abroad.

Indeed, the number of people immigrating to Zug from abroad last year amounted to 2,967, though during the same year 2,123 left.

Figures also showed that the foreign population grew more strongly than the indigenous one, the former growing by 2.5 per cent compared with the latter of 0.7 per cent. In all, last year there were 34,991 foreign national residents in the canton, making up 27.9 per cent of the population, compared with 27.5 in 2016; the Swiss average is 25.1 per cent.

As to the individual municipalities, Cham grew the most strongly at 2.2 per cent, with Risch (at 1.5 per cent) and Steinhausen (at 1.4 per cent), Unterägeri and the city of Zug (both at 1.3 per cent) growing above the cantonal average. Fewer inhabitants were recorded in Hünenberg (down by 3) and Walchwil (down by 9).

Fewer people also moved within the canton last year, just 3,705 of them, compared with 4,168 in 2016.
Other interesting figures published by the Cantonal Department of Planning in this area showed that one third of the growth in population was due to a surplus in the number of births amounting to 462.

Although the following statistics, from a different source, relate to 2016, they were only recently published and show that the number of people employed that year rose to 110,588, an increase of 1.1 per cent on the previous year. This is the equivalent of 87,436 full-time jobs, also up by 1.1per cent. This also shows that the number of people engaged in part-time work had remained constant.

Of the 17,709 firms registered in the canton that year, by far the most of them,15,459, (or 87.3 per cent) were in the service sector,1,651 (or 9.3 per cent) were in the manufacturing sector, and just 599 (or 3.4 per cent) were in the agricultural and forestry sector, meaning that two-thirds of all employees in the canton worked in the service sector.

Most of the people involved in the service sector, 13,597 of them, worked in retail (excluding vehicle sales), albeit 217 fewer than in 2015. However, far more people that year worked in employment agencies (up by 548), 291 more worked in civil engineering, and 264 more worked in preparatory building-site operations, building installation and other supporting trades.