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Ludwig Erhard
Photo: Engelbert Reineke, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, via Wikimedia Commons21

Ludwig Erhard

Chancellor of West Germany from 1963 to 1966

Ludwig Wilhelm Erhard (German: [ˈluːtvɪç ˈʔeːɐ̯haʁt]; 4 February 1897 – 5 May 1977) was a German politician and economist who served as the second chancellor of West Germany from 1963 until 1966. Affiliated with the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), he is known for leading the West German postwar economic reforms and economic recovery (Wirtschaftswunder, German for "economic miracle") in his role as Minister of Economic Affairs under Chancellor Konrad Adenauer from 1949 to 1963.2

From Wikipedia’s article on Ludwig Erhard (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Born Feb 4, 1897, died May 5, 1977.1

About

During that period, he promoted the concept of the social market economy (soziale Marktwirtschaft), on which Germany's economic policy in the 21st century continues to be based.

In his tenure as Chancellor, however, Erhard lacked support from Adenauer, who remained chairman of the CDU party until 1966. Erhard failed to win the German public's confidence in his handling of a budget deficit and lacked public support for his direction of foreign policy. His popularity waned, and he resigned his chancellorship on 30 November 1966.

From Wikipedia’s article on Ludwig Erhard, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.2

Companies

Early life and education

  • Date not recordedHardenberg-Gymnasium Fürth3
  • Date not recordedGoethe University Frankfurt3
  • Date not recordedSchool of Economics and Social Sciences Nuremberg3

Early life

Ludwig Erhard was born in Fürth, then in the Kingdom of Bavaria, on 4 February 1897. His father Wilhelm Erhard (born 1859) was a Catholic clothing store proprietor, while his mother Augusta adhered to Protestantism. Ludwig had two brothers and a sister, all of whom were raised as Protestants. Ludwig suffered from polio in his third year, resulting in a deformed right foot and forcing him to wear orthopedic shoes for the remainder of his life.

Erhard entered primary school in Fürth at the age of six in 1903 and performed poorly. In 1907, he entered Fürth's Royal Bavarian Vocational High School, where his grades were average. He received his secondary school certificate in 1913. In the following years, he was a commercial apprentice at the Georg Eisenbach textile company in Nuremberg until 1916 and worked thereafter as a retail salesman in his father's draper's shop.

Military service and university

In 1916, Erhard volunteered for the German military. During World War I he was transferred to the 22nd Royal Bavarian Artillery Regiment and trained as a gunner. He first served in the quiet Vosges sector on the Western Front. The regiment was then deployed in the Romanian Campaign on the Eastern Front. He personally saw little combat, but contracted typhus and was sent back to Germany. After he managed a recovery, Erhard returned to his unit. He was badly wounded on his left shoulder, side and leg by an Allied artillery shell on 28 September 1918 during the Fifth Battle of Ypres. Erhard was committed to a military hospital in Recklinghausen, where he underwent seven operations until June 1919. His left arm ended up permanently shorter than his right one.

Due to his injury, he could no longer work as a draper, so Erhard started learning economics in late 1919 at a business college in Nuremberg. He passed the school's exit examination on 22 March 1922 and received a degree in business administration. During his time at school, he developed a friendship with the economist and professor Wilhelm Rieger, to whom Erhard owed much of his convictions of economic liberalism. Thanks to Rieger's intervention, Erhard was able to enroll at the Goethe University Frankfurt in the autumn of 1922. He received his PhD from the university on 12 December 1925 for a dissertation finished in the summer of 1924 under Franz Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer's liberal socialist ideology had a heavy influence on Erhard, especially Oppenheimer's opposition to monopolies. In Frankfurt, he married Luise Schuster, a fellow economist, on 11 December 1923. They had known each other since childhood.

From Wikipedia’s article on Ludwig Erhard (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Career

Occupation: politician, university teacher, economist.9

  • 1976 to 1977Member of the German Bundestag6
  • 1972 to 1976Member of the German Bundestag6
  • 1969 to 1972Member of the German Bundestag6
  • 1966 to 1967Leader of the Christian Democratic Union6
  • 1966 to 1967Chair, Christian Democratic Union8
  • 1965 to 1969Member of the German Bundestag6
  • 1963 to 1966Federal Chancellor of Germany6
  • 1961 to 1965Member of the German Bundestag6
  • 1957 to 1963Vice-Chancellor of Germany6
  • 1957 to 1961Member of the German Bundestag6
  • 1953 to 1957Member of the German Bundestag6
  • 1949 to 1963Chair, Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy7
More of their career (5)
  • 1949 to 1953Member of the German Bundestag6
  • 1945 to 1946Bavarian minister of economics6
  • Date not recordedWorked at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München4
  • Date not recordedWorked at University of Bonn4
  • Date not recordedFounded Ludwig-Erhard-Stiftung5

Early career

After his graduation, they moved to Fürth and he became an executive in his father's company in 1925. Erhard spent the next three years as a mostly unemployed academic. His father retired in 1928. The same year, thanks to the help of Rieger and Oppenheimer, Erhard became a part-time research assistant at the Institut für Wirtschaftsbeobachtung der deutschen Fertigware (Economic Observation of the German Finished Goods Industry), a marketing research institute founded by Wilhelm Rudolf Mann and de:Wilhelm Vershofen. Later he became deputy director of the institute.

During World War II he worked on concepts for a postwar peace; however, officially such studies were forbidden by the Nazis, who had declared 'total war'. As a result, Erhard lost his job in 1942, but continued to work on the subject by order of the Reichsgruppe Industrie. He wrote War Finances and Debt Consolidation (orig: Kriegsfinanzierung und Schuldenkonsolidierung) in 1944; in this study, he assumed that Germany had already lost the war. He sent his thoughts to Carl Friedrich Goerdeler, a central figure in the German resistance to Nazism, who recommended Erhard to his comrades. Erhard also discussed his concept with Otto Ohlendorf, deputy secretary of state in the Reichsministerium für Wirtschaft. Ohlendorf himself spoke out for "active and courageous entrepreneurship (aktives und wagemutiges Unternehmertum)", which was intended to replace bureaucratic state planning of the economy after the war.

Post-war career

When the war had finished, Erhard became an economic consultant. Under the Bizone established by the American and British administration in 1947, he led the Sonderstelle Geld und Kredit ("Special Office for Money and Credit"), an expert commission preparing the currency reform in Germany's western zones of occupation. The commission began its deliberations in October 1947, and the following April produced the so-called Homburg plan, elements of which were adopted by the Allies in the currency reform that set the stage for the recovery of the economy.

In April 1948, Erhard was elected director of economics by the Bizonal Economic Council. On 20 June 1948, the Deutsche Mark was introduced. Erhard abolished the price-fixing and production controls that had been enacted by the military administration. This exceeded his authority, but he succeeded with this step. In July 1948, a group of southwest German businessmen attacked the restrictive credit policy of Erhard as Economic Director. While Erhard had designed this policy to assure currency stability and stimulate the economy via consumption, businesses feared the scarcity of investment capital would hinder economic recovery.

From Wikipedia’s article on Ludwig Erhard (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Personal life

  • BornFeb 4, 1897, Fürth10
  • DiedMay 5, 1977, Bonn11
  • CitizenshipGermany12
  • ResidenceGmund am Tegernsee13
  • SpouseLuise Erhard14
  • Children115

Awards

  • 1977honorary citizen of Ulm16
  • 1961Grand Cross of the Military Order of Saint James of the Sword16 18
  • 1961Grand Cross of the Order of Isabella the Catholic16
  • 1960honorary doctor of the University of Madrid Complutense16
  • 1959Bavarian Order of Merit16
  • 1955Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic16 17
  • 1953Grand Cross 1st class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany16
  • Date not recordedGrand Cross of the Order of the Sun of Peru‎16
  • Date not recordedHonorary doctor of the Technical University of Berlin16
  • Date not recordedOrder of Merit for National Foundation16
  • Date not recordedhonorary citizen of Bonn16

Sources

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