Minimum wage approved.

A minimum wage of CHF23.90 ($26.74) was approved by voters in Switzerland’s largest city, according to left-wing organizations. On Sunday, a minimum wage project was also approved by Winterthur, a nearby city.

Approximately 17,000 workers in Zurich who currently make less than CHF23 per hour, the majority of whom are women working in low-wage industries like cleaning, restaurants, and retail, approved the proposal with a 69.4% approval rate.

Left-wing and centrist political parties, as well as charitable organizations, were behind the campaigns, arguing that the minimum wage was an essential weapon in the fight against poverty.

The measure, according to its detractors, would only assist a small percentage of the “working poor,” the majority of whom already earn more than the minimum wage but still struggle to make ends meet for other reasons. The increased bureaucracy brought up by the new wage was another grievance raised by the group.

Apprentices, interns, and individuals under the age of 25 without additional work qualifications will not be eligible for the wage.

A CHF23 minimum wage was approved by voters in the municipality of Winterthur in the canton of Zurich on Sunday as well. There, 3,600 people, or 5% of all employees, stand to gain.

A CANONICAL AFFAIR.

There is no national minimum wage in Switzerland. However, five of the country’s 26 cantons—Neuchâtel, Jura, Ticino, Geneva, and Basel City—have enacted one as a result of the public vote. The hourly rates range from CHF20 to CHF23.

In a trade union-backed initiative that was put before voters on the national level in 2014, a resounding 76.3% of voters rejected what would have been the highest national minimum wage in the history of the world, or CHF22.

With the passage of the measures on Sunday, Switzerland will have its first municipal (local) minimum wage.

It is still unclear whether such a local measure is legally admissible, and the issue may still be brought up in court, according to the Keystone-SDA news agency.