Buffett And Gates Encourage Billionaires To Donate At Least Half of Their Fortunes

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Jun 16th 2010 at 7:02PM

Last year I wrote about the secret meeting of some of the world's biggest philanthropists. Now Fortune has revealed sone of what happened during that meeting. Fortune's Carol Loomis reports that Bill Gates, Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett are making a plea to the nation's richest citizens. They are asking the nation's billionaires to pledge at least half their net worth to charity, in their lifetimes or at death. Gates tells Fortune that he thinks 50 percent should be the "low bar" and that people should actally give more. Buffet also reaffirmed his own philanthropy pedge saying that he and his family decided to "keep all we can conceivably need and distribute the rest to society, for its needs" giving away more than 99 percent of his wealth.

And they aren't alone. Fortune says that other billionaires who have already committed to at least a 50 percent pledge include Eli and Edy Broad, John and Ann Doerr, H.F. "Gerry" and Marguerite Lenfest and John and Tashia Morgridge. The Fortune article goes on to say that after the first billionaires' dinner there were several more dinners set up by the Gateses. Part of the goal was just to talk about giving and why some people don't give as much as they could. In the article Melinda Gates explains that the first part of the pledge campaign is just to help move people forward in the direction of thinking about giving and what good their money can do in the world and to plan ahead. The initiative is a long-term one and given, the potential money at stake, one which has the power to reimagine the social landscape.

Tags: bill gates, melinda gates, philanthropy, warren buffett

Filed under: Big Givers

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Wordsofwisdom Jun 16th 2010 7:28PM

It's not going to make the future any different by giving away their money. Gates just feels bad about making the worst monopoly ever conceived plus the worst OS ever! Buffett just doesn't like the idea of money not doing something, so he has to give it away, there aren't any other businesses he can get into.

vor Jun 23rd 2010 7:53PM

WORDSOFWISDOM

Thats the dumbest thing I've ever heard. I think your views are in the minority, since Windows 7 over-took Apple's market share in a week.

"Buffett just doesn't like the idea of money not doing something, so he has to give it away, there aren't any other businesses he can get into."

I mean....really...(FACE-PALM)