Thomas Köster

Thomas Köster (born October 28, 1946 in Menden ) is a German economic and association politician. He was managing director of the umbrella association of the craft in North Rhine-Westphalia ( Nordrhein-Westfälischer Handwerkstag - NWHT) and managing director of the Düsseldorf Chamber of Crafts , one of the largest self-governing institutions of the economy in the Federal Republic of Germany.

Life

Thomas Köster was born in 1946 as the fourth child of master furrier Karl Georg Koester in the Sauerland . After graduating from high school in 1966, he studied economics at the University of Cologne . There he was first chairman of the AStA in 1968/69 and a member of the university's senate. In 1972 he completed his studies with an examination for a degree in economics . In 1984 he became a Dr.rer.pol in Cologne with an economic history thesis on the development of municipal financial systems . PhD .

In 1972 he began as a personal advisor to the President of the Chamber of Crafts and Member of the Bundestag Georg Schulhoff at the Düsseldorf Chamber of Crafts. Since 1983 he has been managing director , since 2004 managing director of the Chamber of Crafts for the Düsseldorf administrative region . From 1984 to 2010 he was the sole managing director of the Rheinisch-Westfälischer Handwerkerbund (RWHT) and the North Rhine-Westphalian Crafts Day (NWHT).

Thomas Köster is Catholic, has been married since 1972 and has three children. He lives in Düsseldorf-Kaiserswerth . Since 1966 he has been a member of the AV Rheinstein Cologne in the CV .

politics

Thomas Köster has been a member of the CDU since 1970 and was a member of the board of the CDU Düsseldorf from 1987 to 2004. From 1984 to 1987 he was a member of the City Council of Düsseldorf . He was the state and federal party congress delegate of the Düsseldorf CDU. He from 1991 to 2007 Chairman, since 2007 Honorary Chairman of the District Association Bergisches country of small businesses association of the CDU in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW). He is also a member of the executive board of the SME and Business Association in North Rhine-Westphalia.

Köster played a decisive role in the creation

• the North Rhine-Westphalian training consensus, to which the state government, business organizations, trade unions and municipalities came together to promote vocational training for young people, and which then became the model for the training consensus at the federal level,
• the North Rhine-Westphalian start-up and SME offensive GO! , a joint action by the state and business with a range of services to promote young companies,
• the start-up funding for master craftsmen in North Rhine-Westphalia with the "master start-up bonus".

Other offices

• Member of the Board of Directors of the NRW Culture and Economy Forum
• Member of the board of directors of the Rhine-Westphalian Institute for Economic Research (RWI), Essen
• Member of the advisory board of the Financial Research Institute at the University of Cologne
• Chairman of the SME working group of the Federation of Catholic Entrepreneurs (BKU)
• Since 2002 member of the board of trustees of the Foundation From Workshop to Workshop for Vocational Training in Eastern Europe

honors and awards

Thomas Köster was awarded the Cross of Merit on Ribbon in 1987, the Cross of Merit 1st Class in 2000 and the Great Cross of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in 2012. In 1999 he was awarded the Gold Medal of Honor by the Central Association of German Crafts (ZDH). On August 20, 2008 he received the Order of Merit of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia . During the autumn plenary meeting of the Düsseldorf Chamber of Crafts on November 17, 2011, President Wolfgang Schulhoff awarded him the Golden Ring of Honor of the Chamber of Crafts. The West German Chamber of Crafts awarded him the badge of honor on April 24, 2012.

Fonts

• Thomas Köster: The development of municipal financial systems using the example of Great Britain, France and Germany 1790-1980 , Duncker & Humblot Verlag, 1984, ISBN 978-3-428-05677-4
• Thomas Köster: About founding fathers, successors and paper tigers. Plea for a vitalization of competition policy. In H.-F. Eckey (Ed.): Ordnungspolitik. Stuttgart (2001), pp. 461-497
• Thomas Köster: Principle of self-responsibility , position paper from MIT Germany, adopted on November 3, 2003
• Thomas Köster: Wilhelm von Humboldt: The limits of the effectiveness of the state , Neue Zürcher Zeitung, April 3, 2007
• Thomas Köster: Medium-sized companies and the social market economy. In: The New Order No. 3 (2011), pp. 214–226

Web links

• Literature by and about Thomas Köster in the catalog of the German National Library
• CV of Thomas Köster
• Speech by Thomas Köster at the 13th International Cartel Conference on March 26, 2007 in Munich
• Competence center for the social market economy at the Düsseldorf Chamber of Crafts