I remember in 2001 (could be 2002) having a discussion with a flat mate, in which he argued that ultimately, Bill Gates would be a force for good through his foundation.
I was unconvinced, given the Microsoft of the 1990s, but I think that ultimately he was right.
The more interesting question is: Would the world be a better place had MS not been so successful?
A back of the envelope analysis would suggest that, given how Bill Gates has behaved with his fortune, who is likely to benefit from his foundation work and who suffered from MS practices, overall the world is a better place.
I couldn't agree more. Bill G. is arguably the greatest philanthropist of our time, perhaps of all time. Not only does he bring his considerable wealth, but the business acumen to make sure the money is effectively spent, and a keen eye for detail into solving some of the world's toughest problems.
I can't think of anyone more deserving of the Nobel Peace Prize than Bill & Melinda.
Question: Would Netscape exist today, and if so, would they have been like Google? At the hands of Netscape, would the Internet have been more open today?
He's making the world a better place, through a 'voluntary' tax. (People don't have to buy Microsoft products, if they don't want to. But when they do, they enrich Gates a bit more and thus contribute to his actions.)
I hope to see more of this from other rich people. I think it may be one of the best and most efficient ways to equalize the world.
I have a different question -- why is philanthropy on this scale such a predominantly American phenomenon? And even on smaller, less mega-wealthy scales? Why is European wealth not associated with charitable foundations and such kinds of global funding?
Is it because the role of the state is supposed to be so much greater in Europe? Whereas in the US, personal / family charity takes the place of a less encompassing social role of government?
Just doing some random searching, I find reports that US charitable giving is 2 to 5x greater than in European countries (as share of GDP).
Maybe it's also tied up in the US tendency to give donations to political causes, etc? Or the idea that the newness of American cities, towns led to a culture of people contributing to civic works (whereas in Europe, most things already "existed")? Like how in the US, universities had to be founded and funded by benefactors in an ongoing way, whereas in Europe, they're so old and "set for life" that they don't need alumni to support them (or are more fully funded by the state)?
Slower economic growth and a lower quality of governance more generally, meaning that there's a huge incentive for precautionary saving. A whole lot of the wealth you're talking about in Europe was created back when the government was a lot smaller and really focused on growth, the Wirtschaftwunder. But those times are past, and there are not many who expect them to come back. So you just focus on keeping what you have.
You have answered the question yourself. It's a showcase for innovative, low-carbon emission technology. Almost all of international commerce of tangible goods and resources is via ship traffic and ships are major polluters.
Gates is always interested in technological solutions to problems.
As much as I'm generally for wealth redistribution, that's not how it works. Gates and probably Bezos especially want to control their companies. They founded them, after all. So for that they own shares and those shares are the bulk of their money.
Also, I don't know about Amazon, but Microsoft was actually famous for distributing wealth quite well:
> The company's 1986 initial public offering (IPO), and subsequent rise in its share price, created three billionaires and an estimated 12,000 millionaires among Microsoft employees.
> Like why doesn't Gates or Bezos give everyone a $100k bonus and keep a billion?
If you're looking to do philanthropic actions, giving all employees $100k doesn't do anything. It merely increases the wealth of those employees by a bit. What about fighting malaria? What about fighting climate change? Do you seriously expect all those recipients of $100k would all contribute as much proportionally?
And those employees have already been paid their agreed wages/salaries. So why does giving them extra money makes it more philanthropic?
You need it explained why helping vulnerable and poor groups instead of giving a bonus to your already well payed employees is considered philanthropic? I really don't see what you're driving at here.
Microsoft had generous stock option grants to employees. The Seattle Times reported in the 1990s that there were 10,000 Microsoft millionaires in the area.
Getting rejected by Microsoft in the 1980s is one of the ways I've cleverly avoided becoming a billionaire :-)
Your money just goes a lot further when paying for the general provision of public goods (not just giving someone a bonus and calling it "profit sharing") in very poor countries. Some social scientists and analysts are talking about a 1000x multiplier: the social benefit of spending $1 for targeted philanthropy in poorer countries might be the same as someone in a first-world country spending $1000 on their private consumption.
> Can someone explain to me why it's more philanthropic to amass billions instead of sharing profits with employees?
Because you have to dedicate immense resources in a concentrated approach for an extremely long period of time, to conquer some major problems like Malaria or to develop an HIV vaccine or to drive down vaccine production & distribution costs (& difficulties) for the third world. Private philanthropy can often maneuver at speeds that government money can't, take risks governments don't like to, and go places that government money takes far longer to go (there are typically few stakeholders, decision makers - Bill Gates can just decide tomorrow to put a billion dollars behind a thing, whereas the same action might take many months or years by a government body).
If you have 100,000 people and give them each $100,000, their actions will be wildly disparate and will make essentially no impact on major problems. They may make small dents in very local problems, at best (and or improve the well-being of their unit: their family, neighborhood, community and similar). There's nothing wrong with that mind you. However standard local problems already have heavily proven systems that work on them, particularly local government + taxation (this is obviously dependent on the effectiveness of the local government in question and the taxation; regardless it has been repeatedly shown to be highly effective all around the world).
I believe Microsoft has created a huge amount of money for their employees (their IPO created billionaires and order of thousands or tens of thousands of millionaires).
I don't think Microsofot employees feeling snubbed by their CEOs.
So in this case Bill Gates is doing both. Sharing profit as well as being philanthropic.
Pleasure. I feel sorry about Bill and Melinda because the expectations of them are super high as you just proved yourself. Instead of laying on the beach of a private island they travel around the world meeting people having what-not ilnesses. For any sane person this must be a taxing experience. They need to wind down from time to time. I would have taken a gap year a decade ago. What they do is admirable. And if he wants to buy a billion $ coffee mug he should - it's well earned after all.
'The investment underlines Gates’s long-standing interest in alternative fuels, and his enthusiasm for new technology that could tackle emissions from industry and transport that together make up 75% of the world’s carbon footprint.'
I think Gates means well and it's commendable how he puts his money where his mouth is. But, blank aid only works as a a temporary fix.
What drives society out of poverty is a mix of reasonably levels of free markets, respect of private property, security, affordable health, low corruption, low marginal economy, and a stable law system.
Aid seems to be counter-productive in the long run because it kills the local markets and makes people dependent on it.
You seriously underestimate the work of the Gates Foundation. It's not about aid as a temporary fix at all and they are well aware of the problems you mention.
Good points, but the commonly stated objective of philanthropy is to solve entire categories of problems. You could go on giving billions of dollars to the poor just so they can get by, and eventually that money would run out, and if the people you were helping weren’t worse off, they likely wouldn’t be much better off by then. But money spent on attempting to eradicate malaria for example doesn’t have the same dynamics.
There are also other forms of just regular old charity that have a similar ROI. Money spent on educating children had a tremendous ROI, so does investment in infrastructure.
Actually, some of the problems he's tackling will unshackle certain parts of the world. It's hard for societies to lift themselves when they are encumbered by diseases. If they can free themselves from that situation, they'll do a lot better in future.
>What drives society out of poverty is a mix of reasonably levels of free markets, respect of private property, security, affordable health, low corruption, low marginal economy, and a stable law system.
alecco, I personally fully agree with you. Unfortunately most people do not see that way. People on an average cannot mentally work out the chain of outcomes for a given variable. Thing like respect of private property and free market are way further in the chain than a donation or the overrated 'education'.
I genuinely believe Bill and Melinda Gates care about child poverty and disease, but they do things which are just ethically broken.
“At the core of our foundation’s work is the idea that every person deserves the chance to live a healthy and productive life.”
The issue of child poverty and disease is huge, as they know, and every dollar that goes to it can be put to useful work. How then, can they justify spending $625,000,000 on a mega yacht of obscene luxury?
My donating $7000 dollars to the Against Malaria foundation statistically saves 1 child from dying of Malaria. That foundation is not saying “please stop sending money, we have enough”. They could use more.
Given their stated “core” idea, and such a stark choice between a child’s life and just one $7000 fraction of their new yacht, how on earth did they justify the full 90,000 * $7000 cost?
[+] [-] helsinkiandrew|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dotancohen|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] reallydontask|6 years ago|reply
I was unconvinced, given the Microsoft of the 1990s, but I think that ultimately he was right.
The more interesting question is: Would the world be a better place had MS not been so successful?
A back of the envelope analysis would suggest that, given how Bill Gates has behaved with his fortune, who is likely to benefit from his foundation work and who suffered from MS practices, overall the world is a better place.
[+] [-] bobosha|6 years ago|reply
I can't think of anyone more deserving of the Nobel Peace Prize than Bill & Melinda.
[+] [-] dvfjsdhgfv|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hliyan|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RickJWagner|6 years ago|reply
He's making the world a better place, through a 'voluntary' tax. (People don't have to buy Microsoft products, if they don't want to. But when they do, they enrich Gates a bit more and thus contribute to his actions.)
I hope to see more of this from other rich people. I think it may be one of the best and most efficient ways to equalize the world.
[+] [-] supernova87a|6 years ago|reply
Is it because the role of the state is supposed to be so much greater in Europe? Whereas in the US, personal / family charity takes the place of a less encompassing social role of government?
Just doing some random searching, I find reports that US charitable giving is 2 to 5x greater than in European countries (as share of GDP).
Maybe it's also tied up in the US tendency to give donations to political causes, etc? Or the idea that the newness of American cities, towns led to a culture of people contributing to civic works (whereas in Europe, most things already "existed")? Like how in the US, universities had to be founded and funded by benefactors in an ongoing way, whereas in Europe, they're so old and "set for life" that they don't need alumni to support them (or are more fully funded by the state)?
[+] [-] onion2k|6 years ago|reply
European tax law doesn't let wealthy people write off donations to the same extent as American tax law.
[+] [-] zozbot234|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] discobot|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] saadalem|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pg_bot|6 years ago|reply
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-51446663
[+] [-] edhelas|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jonathanstrange|6 years ago|reply
Gates is always interested in technological solutions to problems.
[+] [-] d-d|6 years ago|reply
Like why doesn't Gates or Bezos give everyone a $100k bonus and keep a billion?
[+] [-] oblio|6 years ago|reply
Also, I don't know about Amazon, but Microsoft was actually famous for distributing wealth quite well:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft
> The company's 1986 initial public offering (IPO), and subsequent rise in its share price, created three billionaires and an estimated 12,000 millionaires among Microsoft employees.
[+] [-] chii|6 years ago|reply
If you're looking to do philanthropic actions, giving all employees $100k doesn't do anything. It merely increases the wealth of those employees by a bit. What about fighting malaria? What about fighting climate change? Do you seriously expect all those recipients of $100k would all contribute as much proportionally?
And those employees have already been paid their agreed wages/salaries. So why does giving them extra money makes it more philanthropic?
[+] [-] ggtfggyyy|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] WalterBright|6 years ago|reply
Microsoft had generous stock option grants to employees. The Seattle Times reported in the 1990s that there were 10,000 Microsoft millionaires in the area.
Getting rejected by Microsoft in the 1980s is one of the ways I've cleverly avoided becoming a billionaire :-)
[+] [-] eru|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zozbot234|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] adventured|6 years ago|reply
Because you have to dedicate immense resources in a concentrated approach for an extremely long period of time, to conquer some major problems like Malaria or to develop an HIV vaccine or to drive down vaccine production & distribution costs (& difficulties) for the third world. Private philanthropy can often maneuver at speeds that government money can't, take risks governments don't like to, and go places that government money takes far longer to go (there are typically few stakeholders, decision makers - Bill Gates can just decide tomorrow to put a billion dollars behind a thing, whereas the same action might take many months or years by a government body).
If you have 100,000 people and give them each $100,000, their actions will be wildly disparate and will make essentially no impact on major problems. They may make small dents in very local problems, at best (and or improve the well-being of their unit: their family, neighborhood, community and similar). There's nothing wrong with that mind you. However standard local problems already have heavily proven systems that work on them, particularly local government + taxation (this is obviously dependent on the effectiveness of the local government in question and the taxation; regardless it has been repeatedly shown to be highly effective all around the world).
[+] [-] newnewpdro|6 years ago|reply
You're certainly not being philanthropic giving those billions to your already handsomely paid employees whose welfare is already more than secured.
[+] [-] j7ake|6 years ago|reply
I don't think Microsofot employees feeling snubbed by their CEOs.
So in this case Bill Gates is doing both. Sharing profit as well as being philanthropic.
[+] [-] 0xBA5ED|6 years ago|reply
Would be a neat social experiment. Give all your employees FU money and see how many show up the next day.
[+] [-] Sebguer|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] martokus|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gargs|6 years ago|reply
'The investment underlines Gates’s long-standing interest in alternative fuels, and his enthusiasm for new technology that could tackle emissions from industry and transport that together make up 75% of the world’s carbon footprint.'
It's an 'investment'.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/feb/09/bill-gate...
[+] [-] alecco|6 years ago|reply
What drives society out of poverty is a mix of reasonably levels of free markets, respect of private property, security, affordable health, low corruption, low marginal economy, and a stable law system.
Aid seems to be counter-productive in the long run because it kills the local markets and makes people dependent on it.
[+] [-] jonathanstrange|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] AmericanChopper|6 years ago|reply
There are also other forms of just regular old charity that have a similar ROI. Money spent on educating children had a tremendous ROI, so does investment in infrastructure.
[+] [-] jfoster|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dennis_jeeves|6 years ago|reply
alecco, I personally fully agree with you. Unfortunately most people do not see that way. People on an average cannot mentally work out the chain of outcomes for a given variable. Thing like respect of private property and free market are way further in the chain than a donation or the overrated 'education'.
[+] [-] thundergolfer|6 years ago|reply
“At the core of our foundation’s work is the idea that every person deserves the chance to live a healthy and productive life.”
The issue of child poverty and disease is huge, as they know, and every dollar that goes to it can be put to useful work. How then, can they justify spending $625,000,000 on a mega yacht of obscene luxury?
My donating $7000 dollars to the Against Malaria foundation statistically saves 1 child from dying of Malaria. That foundation is not saying “please stop sending money, we have enough”. They could use more.
Given their stated “core” idea, and such a stark choice between a child’s life and just one $7000 fraction of their new yacht, how on earth did they justify the full 90,000 * $7000 cost?