Heinz Haller

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Heinz Haller (born March 19, 1914 in Schwenningen ; † June 13, 2004 in Stäfa , Switzerland ) was a German economist and State Secretary .

Life

Haller, Protestant, was born the son of an opera singer and grew up in an art-loving family. From 1939 he was with Hildegard, geb. Mason, married. He had a son Gert-Rüdiger (1944-2010) and a daughter Bettina (born 1950). Haller was a music and art lover and holder of the Great Federal Cross of Merit . He died on June 13, 2004 at the age of 90 in his adopted Swiss home Stäfa on Lake Zurich. In its obituary, the Neue Zürcher Zeitung wrote that German-speaking finance was losing “one of its most important representatives of the post-war period”.

Training and military service

After graduating from secondary school in Schwenningen, Haller studied economics and finance at the University of Tübingen , where he obtained his degree in economics (1935) and his doctorate. rer. pole. (1936) graduated. From 1936 to 1938 he did his military service. After a brief activity in the accounting and balance sheet auditing of Schwäbische Treuhand AG, Stuttgart, he had to return to military service in December 1939. In July 1945 he returned from captivity.

Working as a university professor

After his return, Haller resumed his work for Schwäbische Treuhand AG for a short time, but then decided on a university career and in 1946 became a research assistant at the University of Tübingen, where he worked as a private lecturer from 1948 after his habilitation. In 1953 Haller became an adjunct professor in Tübingen, and a year later he followed a call to Kiel as a full professor of economics and finance at the Christian Albrechts University in Kiel. From 1957 to 1967 Haller was a professor in his field at Heidelberg University . His best-known work Finanzpolitik comes from this time , with which Haller became one of the founders of modern finance, which embeds the tax authorities in the general economic cycle and no longer sees itself as "sovereign over the citizens" like classic economics. In 1967 Haller accepted a professorship and as head of the economics institute there at the University of Zurich , in order to have more time and peace for concentrated scientific work than the hectic reforms at German universities had given him. In 1968 Haller was appointed to the independent commission of experts for the preparation of the tax reform by the then Federal Minister of Finance Franz Josef Strauss . After his work as State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Finance , during which he fulfilled his teaching assignment to a limited extent, Haller was again fully active as a teacher and researcher in Zurich in 1972. In addition, he continued to work on the scientific advisory boards of the Federal Ministry of Finance and the Federal Ministry of Economics. In October 1981 he retired in Zurich, but also remained active in retirement and commented on current economic and financial issues in various newspaper articles.

Activity as State Secretary

From April 15, 1970 - temporarily until 1972 - Haller accepted the post of second State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Finance . His special task was to prepare the planned tax reform, for which a working group of the ministry had already been formed and acted - while maintaining the connection with the tax commission - and to bring it to a decision. After the resignation of Federal Finance Minister Alex Möller in May 1971, Haller initially remained in office at the request of his successor, Karl Schiller . However, as a result there were differences between Haller and Minister Schiller, which finally led Haller to resign from his position as State Secretary on February 28, 1972. At this point in time there were already draft bills for a new tax code and for the reform of wealth tax, inheritance tax and property tax, as well as drafts for a new income tax and a new corporation tax (crediting procedure). These reform plans were implemented in 1974 (wealth tax, inheritance tax, property tax), 1975 (partial reform of income tax) and 1977 (tax code and corporation tax).

Works (selection)

  • Is there a wage theory? , Tübingen 1936
  • Type and law in economics , Stuttgart / Cologne 1950
  • Financial policy - basics and main problems , Tübingen 1957
  • Taxes - the basics of a rational system of public taxes , Tübingen 1964
  • On the problem of a rational tax system , Kiel 1965
  • The problem of monetary stability , 1966
  • Rarely forsaken by luck. Memoirs , 1992

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ A great man in finance. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung from June 16, 2004.
  2. ^ Süddeutsche Zeitung of March 21, 1989.
personal data
SURNAME Haller, Heinz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German economist and State Secretary
DATE OF BIRTH March 19, 1914
PLACE OF BIRTH Schwenningen
DATE OF DEATH June 13, 2004
Place of death Stäfa , Switzerland