The trouble with amassing a vast fortune is the difficulty in deciding how to give it away. Philanthropy, AKA the generous donation of money to good causes, is somewhat of a second job for some of the world's richest people; a list which had a bit of a shake up this week.
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Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon, had a brief taste of how it feels to be the world’s richest man – albeit it only for a few hours.
Bezos overtook Microsoft founder Bill Gates when his fortune reached a net worth of $90.9 billion (£68bn), after Amazon's stock rose by 1.6 per cent (largely thanks to their earlier acquisition of Whole Foods).
It was a case of pride before a fall though, as Bezos was knocked off the top spot when Amazon’s stock dropped by three per cent. Bezos, who owns 16.7 per cent of Amazon, is now worth a measly $89.3bn (£68bn), and Gates is worth $90.7bn (£68bn), according to Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index. But with Gates focused on investing more and more of his money and Bezos’s wealth growing, it’s only a matter of time before Bezos takes his place on the pedestal.
We often keep a close eye on how the wealthy manage their fortune. In the spirit of scrutiny, it's fair to say that Bezos’s charitable history has been conservative in comparison to some other tech giants.
Philanthropist expert Gates had given away $31.1bn (£23bn) over his lifetime through the end of 2016, which is substantially more than Bezos, who had given away about $100 million (£76m) through to the end of 2015.
Never mind comparing him to Gates – Bezos' parents are the founders and funders of Bezos Family Foundation, which invests in education for young people.
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Bezos also isn't part of Bill Gates' Giving Pledge - but is still a self-confessed invesstor in long-term causes. He is the sole owner of space exploration company Blue Origin, which aims to reduce the cost of spaceflight, with the end-goal of moving heavy industrial and manufacturing industries off the planet – making space work a reality and, in Bezos’ opinion, saving the planet.
He also owns the Washington Post, which he brought for $250m (£190m) in 2013, and contributes to society in a way much different to the ventures of most tech giants.
Now, Bezos has announced that he wants to broaden his charitable giving into more short term goals. Interestingly took to Twitter for inspiration, asking his 311K followers for ideas in June this year. The tweet has since been retweeted more than 10,000 times and liked more than 21,000 times, and the replies flooded in, suggesting that Bezos invest in AWS infrastructure and data centers in Africa, libraries and service dogs for veterans suffering from PTSD.
“This tweet is a request for ideas. I’m thinking about a philantrophy strategy that is the opposite of how I mostly spend my time- working on the long term,” he said.
Bezos has already kicked off this goal in some forms; Amazon is building a new office later this year that will become a permanent homeless shelter for families, through the charity Mary's Place. The future is very much about the now for Bezos, who could shake up how the wealthy tend to invest, but many tech leaders already have an impressive philantrophic history.
If you look up synonyms for 'rich', you’re sure to find ‘Bill Gates’ in the list. The co-founder of Microsoft has sat atop Forbes' list of the world's billionaires for 18 out of the past 23 years, and has gained worldwide respect for his dedication to using his wealth to help others.
In an interview in 2013, Gates said: “Money has no utility to me beyond a certain point. Its utility is entirely in building an organisation and getting the resources out to the poorest in the world.”
And he certainly is true to his word. Gates, alongside Melinda and his fellow business mogul Warren Buffet, created the Giving Pledge – an open invitation for billionaires to dedicate the majority of their wealth to charitable causes.
He also runs the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; the world's largest private charitable organisation, which has dedicated itself to the small task of eliminating polio and fighting hunger and poverty. More than $30 billion gas been donated to the Foundation and Gates also joined 19 other investors and technology leaders in 2016 to put more than one billion dollars (£793m) into a fund aiming to solve climate change-related problems.
The CEO of Google sits on the boards of several nonprofit companies, like the X Prize foundation which invests in technological innovation to solve world problems including access to clean water, quality healthcare, education and affordable housing.
Larry Page is also president of the Carl Victor Page Memorial Fund, which raises funds for a variety of social issues such as education, medicine, poverty, and family issues.
The founder of Facebook wants to cure, prevent or manage all disease by 2100.
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Just like Gates, Zuckerberg does a lot of his charitable work with his partner and pediatrician, Priscilla Chan. The couple invested $3bn (£2.3bn) of their personal finances into The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, which aims to "advance human potential and promote equality" by investing in leading ideas in engineering and tech.
When the pair announced the Initiative they said it would be used to give away 99 per cent of their money earned through the operation of Facebook. In 2010, Zuckerberg announced that he was donating $100m (£76m) to the Newark, New Jersey, public school system. He made the announcement whilst appearing on the Oprah Winfrey Show. Zuckerberg is also signed up to Gates’ Giving Pledge.
The chief operating officer (COO) of Facebook has been named the most powerful woman in technology on the Forbes’ 100 Most Powerful Women list, earning her spot in a male-dominated profession.
Sandberg invests her money into supporting women, and she hit headlines last year when she donated roughly $100m (£76m) in Facebook stock into the donor advised fund. The fund went towards Lean In, a women empowerment group which Sandberg founded, anti-poverty organisations including Second Harvest Food Bank, and grief organisations such as Kara.
Sheryl is also a board member of Women for Women International, a non-profit organisation which supports women in war-torn regions by giving them financial and emotional aid, job-skills training, education, and small business assistance.
The founder and largest shareholder of Oracle is worth $52.2bn (£39bn) and is part of the Giving Pledge, promising to give away at least 95 per cent of his wealth to charitable causes.
The avid sailor donated $200m (£152m) to create a cancer treatment centre – called the Lawrence J. Ellison Institute for Transformative Medicine of USC – in 2016.
Ellison also conducts philantrophy in his own name. The Ellison Medical Foundation stopped funding anti-aging and medical research in 2013 and was renamed as the Lawrence Ellison Foundation, which branched out into education and wildlife conservation as well as biomedical research.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
