Categories: Need to know

Billionaires spreading the wealth

Mark Zuckerberg joins group of tycoons pledging to give away their fortunes

by macleans.ca on Thursday, December 9, 2010 11:36am - 5 Comments

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and 15 other wealthy entrepreneurs are signing away the majority of their fortunes as part of the “Giving Pledge,” a philanthropic effort created by Microsoft founder Bill Gates and investor Warren Buffett. The sixteen new members of the exclusive club include AOL co-founder Steve Chase, investor Carl Icahn and junk-bond genius Michael Milken, and bring the pledge’s membership to more than fifty. “I view this as a call to others who might in their thirties or forties use some of their creativity to get involved in philanthropy earlier in life,” says Milken. This comes at a time when the poor economy is driving down charitable donations, with philanthropic giving in the U.S. falling 3.6 per cent between 2008 and 2009.

Wall Street Journal

Tags: charity

Philanthropist

If they're going to waste their money on the established 'charities' then this is an unfortunate development. Ideally they would use their money to accomplish great things, building something or making new discoveries that would benefit humanity, dumping their cash into the gaping maw of the charity industry will only help those few people who make a very comfortable living within that industry.
Marcus

Does Mark Zuckerberg even have a lot of money? I know he's worth a lot of money on paper, but what does he have in actual liquid assets that he can donate?

I'm sure he's doing better than the average Joe, but he's not in the same class as the others mentioned in thsi post.
Dingoman

Why do they have to spend it on Africans? It's better to spend it on poor Americans or Canadians.

Mike

Where does it say they are giving to africans? I dont see why each millionaire throughout the developed contries give up a million each to cut global debt.[polldaddy 4228238 http://answers.polldaddy.com/poll/4228238/ polldaddy]