Who is Olaf Sholz??

Who is Olaf Scholz?

Scholz is a 63-year-old career politician in the center-left Social Democratic Party. For decades, he has held a wide range of posts: member of parliament, mayor of the port city of Hamburg, labor minister and finance minister in coalition governments under Merkel. He's a known quantity who has a deep understanding of the political process and how to get things done, and because of that, he has often been compared to President Biden.

One of the reasons he and his party prevailed in the federal election is that in Scholz, Germans see a continuation of Merkel's governing style: Scholz is a calm, steady hand in a crisis and a pragmatic leader who strives for compromise.

But there are a few key differences between them. "Angela Merkel grew up in the east of Germany in the GDR. She has a different outlook, particularly on foreign policy and on European policy," says Marcel Fratzscher, president of the German Institute for Economic Research. Under a Scholz-led government, Fratzscher thinks Germany will be more aligned with the United States on the world stage and seek a more assertive, unified European Union.