Bill Gates...You've made your billions from

[Dees]

people around the world. Why don't you anti up a billion or two for tsunami relief?

[cheezus]

1. he could, but

that would take away funds the bill and melinda gates foundation uses to fight the world AIDS problem.

[Deja Q]

3. That's his own foundation. It's just a tax haven/front for all we know.

[ixion]

4. actually, Gates allocates a fair amount of money to philanthropy, albeit

he has alterior motives in many cases.

His work with AIDS and vaccines have been top notch.

And please keep in mind that I despise M$ with a deep burning passion. :evilgrin:

[ProfessorGAC]

5. They Do Give A TON Of Money To Charity

I'm no big fan of Gates' business practices, but his dad and his wife kind of shamed him into sharing the wealth several years back. In recent interviews, he admits to being ashamed he didn't do it sooner.

And, they give hundreds of millions to charities & illness research centers around North America.

I think there might be more altrusim than you might think.
The Professor

[cheezus]

8. think it's 10% of his income?

tho iirc, he used to do almost nothing and was pretty much shamed into starting his foundation.

[ProfessorGAC]

12. That's What I Said

His wife and dad shamed him into it. His goal is to give an amount equal to what he has now, away by the time he dies. That, given potential life expetency, is about 3 or 4% of the net worth, which is probably more than 10% of his current income.

I'd have to look those numbers up for sure. But, i saw the interview he did with Dobbs a couple of years ago and the charity thing came up quite important. Like i said, he ADMITTED he was shamed into giving more money away, and then said he should have started sooner.

I'm not defending his prior actions, but he does appear to have seen the light.
The Professor

[thedevilinthedetails]

16. AND he has also said that he intends to leave

no more than 10% of his worth at his death to his kids, the rest to charity.

Gates gave the ENTIRE dividend he received from his Microsoft stock earlier this year to his foundation. It was like 3 or 4 billion in one huge check, right from Microsoft to the B & M Gates Foundation.

I suspect that Gates will make a huge donation to this crisis when the time is right. He will probably do something "long term" to help rebuild would be my guess.

[bleedingheart]

2. I bet he will help...

[ChickMagic]

6. I saw a program a long time ago

on PBS about the ethics of being rich. Gates' father runs an organisation devoted to being ethically wealthy. His attitude is that if you make a pile of cash in this country, you are indeed lucky and owe your wealth to our system. As such, you are compelled to give back to others. He sounded like a very good guy. I hope it rubbed off on his son.

[Shadowen]

7. Fascinatingly...

...the last time I read a story about Bill Gates' wealth, he was giving obscene amounts of money to charities. Like, tens of billions. Makes me wonder why he's still number one, if he's given all that money away. Or is he still number one?

I'm wondering if he's trying to do something good before whatever happened to devalue him from 100 to 40 billion dollars hits again.

[Sporadicus]

9. I'm Certainly Not Trying to Play Devil's Advocate

or apologize for * & Co. offering a paltry $15M until harsh criticism forced them to pony up a still-paltry $40M, but I question whether the main roadblock to relief efforts is financial or logistical. Efforts of this magnitude require coordination of resources & staging areas set up to handle the matériel required to render aid.

Once the logistics are overcome, by all means let the money flow!

[eallen]

10. Bill Gates does a good job at his philanthropy...

He is pretty much spearheading the effort to find cheap and practically distributable cures for a variety of tropical illnesses, including malaria, river blindness, and others. Each year these diseases kill more people, by orders of magnitude, than the recent tsunami, and maim even more. The pharmaceutical industry doesn't do much research in this area because there's no money in it.

BTW, I think Gates's wealth is due almost entirely to a natural monopoly, that Microsoft's practices have set back the computer industry by a decade or more, and that Microsoft has gotten away lightly with regard to anti-trust efforts. In most ways, I'm a Gates critic. But I like his philanthropic efforts. In a century, he may be more remembered for those than for how he got rich. (If you think that is strange, ask anyone over 50 about Carnegie and his libraries.)

[Dees]

11. I know he has been charitable.

If money greases the wheels of relief and logistics he could do a quick and very helpful fix. I don't know how liquid the man is however.

[high density]

13. He has endowed his foundation with about $27 billion

and $4 billion has been given away so far by his foundation in the past four or five years. How much does this man have to give away before people on DU stop bashing his philanthropy? All of it? I'm not a complete fan of the guy, but implying that he's doing nothing is absurd.

http://www.gatesfoundation.org/

[TwilightZone]

14. Bill Gates gives away more money than anyone alive.

He's given tens of billions away through his foundation.

And don't be surprised if he does exactly what you're suggesting.

[Midlodemocrat]

15. According to Business Week

the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation is the most generous foundation of 2004 with $10,085,000,000 given or pledged. Additionally, his giving is listed as 58% of his net worth. Not a small amount.

However, he did have to be shamed into setting up this foundation, which I thought was rather selfish.