Wolfgang Schäuble was born in Freiburg on and studied law and economics and was awarded the degree of Dr. jur. in 1971. Dr Schäuble has been a member of the German Bundestag since 1972 and served as the Parliamentary Secretary of the CDU/CSU Parliamentary Group from 1981 to 1984. He then held the offices of Federal Minister for Special Tasks and Head of the Federal Chancellery, before serving as Federal Minister of the Interior from 1989 to 1991. Dr Schäuble has been a member of the CDU National Executive Committee since 1989. He headed the CDU/CSU Parliamentary Group in the German Bundestag from 1991 until 2000; from 1998 until 2000 he was also the national chairman of the CDU. He was the Deputy Head of the CDU/CSU Parliamentary Group in the German Bundestag for Foreign, Security and European Policy from 2002 until he was again appointed Federal Minister of the Interior in 2005. Since 2009 he is Federal Minister of Finance.