1984

Bill Gates to give away 99% of his wealth in the next 20 years

https://lemmy.today/post/29141260

Bill Gates to give away 99% of his wealth in the next 20 years - Lemmy Today

> One of the best things I read was an 1889 essay by Andrew Carnegie called The Gospel of Wealth. It makes the case that the wealthy have a responsibility to return their resources to society, a radical idea at the time that laid the groundwork for philanthropy as we know it today. > In the essay’s most famous line, Carnegie argues that “the man who dies thus rich dies disgraced.” I have spent a lot of time thinking about that quote lately. People will say a lot of things about me when I die, but I am determined that “he died rich” will not be one of them.

May 10, 2025 at 9:02pmWeb
Show threadEvergreenGuruMay 10, 2025
More lies at 11.
Show threadBrkdncrMay 10, 2025
The irs accepts donations.
Show threadozonedMay 10, 2025
And he'll still be a billionaire. And he got that money by suppressing the world with proprietary software. He's single handedly helped hold humanity back. I don't care the good he's done as it's built on the back of all the harm he's done.
Show threadArghblargMay 10, 2025
Beat me to it. Anand Giridharadas has spoken on the general scam of billionaires white-washing their legacies like this… their philanthropy seldom approaches, much less exceeds, the harm they did in getting so rich in the first place.
Show threadGeetnerdMay 11, 2025
And somehow, even when proclaiming to give “Most” of their fortunes away, it ends up in a “Charity” or “Philanthropy” they control.
Show threadtaladarMay 10, 2025
He was also a major opponent of the efforts during Covid to waive medical patents for producers in the global south to allow faster distribution of those vaccines.
Show threadwizardbeardMay 11, 2025
Shouldn’t be much of a surprise. His family has always been eugenecists with a “benevolent” mask. Not knocking what his foundation has done against malaria, but I believe he’s said some very direct things about wanting lower birthrates in the global south.
Show threadEcho DotMay 12, 2025

It’s not really about lowering birth rates directly it’s about removing the perceived need for higher birth rates.

There are quite a lot of studies that show that even in countries where infant mortality is now manageable it still takes several generations before that trickles down to the population and they stop having 15 kids as standard. Also lack of sexual education doesn’t help.

Show threadRivalarrivalMay 10, 2025
The fact that he collected billions in the first place is the problem. He should have been charging consumers less, and paying his workers more. He never should have accumulated his obscene wealth to begin with.
Show threadCrashumbcMay 12, 2025
And not being an evil bitch driving competition out of business with illegal practices.
Show threadUncurious3512May 10, 2025
Dibs
Show threadEldritchMay 10, 2025
He’s already been claiming he would for the last 15. It was too little to late back then. He either needs to get busy with it or shut up about it.
Show threadLupusBlackfurMay 10, 2025
At his current 69yrs age, he could get all the busy he wants for his remaining life and still fail to reach the 99% goal. 🙄 🤦‍♀️ 🤡
Show threadGrandwolf319May 10, 2025

People should just call his bluff and ask if he would support a big estate tax.

He literally has the financial resources to lobby congress to make it happen.

I honestly don’t understand why self made billionaires wouldn’t do that, it’s not like their kids are gonna be poor, they will still be rich, just not oligarchs level (which they probably would suck at anyway given how they don’t have proper experience).

Show threadLandless2029May 10, 2025

This is a good comeback. Take that wealth and start lobbying to start fixing shit

He could start up a whole ass organization with departments to fight for education, health care, income equality, homelessness and more.

He could resolve homelessness single handedly by funding homes, but what we need is to fix the machine.

I seriously think we need to focus in fixing education and news/social media regulations to increase critical thinking in the masses and stop the suppression of “woke media”

They’re making everyone dumber and brainwashing the masses. How we got our current leader.

Social media platforms are how many Americans get thier information and news. Purposefully spreading misinformation and suppressing non offensive political views should be a massive fine by the FCC.

Show threadGeetnerdMay 11, 2025

Why would he do that? He’s so rich, he can never go broke.

All his “Foundation” bullshit is PR, after he realized everyone hated him before Bush Jr. made all his troubles go away. I wonder how much that “Donation” was?

Show threadLandless2029May 11, 2025
That’s my point. A “good” billionaire would make moves not promises and donations.
Show threadGeetnerdMay 11, 2025
Agreed.
Show threadLandless2029May 11, 2025

I appreciate how civil most lemmings are. I’ve been wrong and admit fault. Or unclear and clarify.

We also have idiots on here though. I imagine that ratio may change as Lemmy gets more adoption.

Show threadentropicdriftMay 11, 2025
Regression towards the mean is inevitable. The best we can do is hope to model a good culture for future fediverse denizen (fedizens?)
Show threadLandless2029May 11, 2025

I’d prefer fedizen over lemming because I can’t get the old lemmings out of my head.

Show threadGeetnerdMay 11, 2025
Hell, he could buy the country like Musk did. He’s just not as narcissistic as Musk, who made very dumb decisions that would have landed him in prison in a sane reality.
Show thread11111one11111May 11, 2025

Not saying you are wrong or anything. I just remembered seeing Bill Gates’ name being brought up as a supporter of raising the estate tax for the richest rich people. Its not the article I remembered but didn’t feel like spending time sorting thru the search results for the most reliable source but here is a Forbes article that mentions Gates as supporting raising the estate tax:

forbes.com/…/billionaires-more-taxes-gates-buffet…

There is prolly more/better articles out there but all the top search results today are referencing Trump’s estate tax hike that was announced in the past day or so.

These Billionaires Want The Ultra-Wealthy To Pay More In Taxes

Amid an intensifying debate about tax rates for the superrich, at least a dozen of the country’s wealthiest people have stated publicly that they’re on board to fork over more to the government.

Forbes
Show threadNOT_RICKMay 10, 2025
This isn’t exactly news
Show threadGuyFawkesMay 10, 2025
Great; start by paying off all student loans.
Show threadGeetnerdMay 11, 2025

He could do that. Easily.

But he won’t.

Show threadLibra00May 11, 2025
There’s an estimate floating around that it would cost about $20 billion to end all homelessness in the US. Whether or not that’s an accurate estimate, there is an amount that could do it, and every day that billionaires wake up and choose not to do it they choose evil.
Show threadImgonnatrythisMay 10, 2025
People will definitely say that about me when I die too. Thankfully the US healthcare system is pretty damn good at making sure the vast majority of us can say this when we die.
Show threadGeetnerdMay 11, 2025

I’ll leave a 20 year old car, and 3 electric guitars to the needy.

Can I have a library named after me?

Show threadtauloverMay 10, 2025
Donate to his own foundation which he controls
Show threadDayroom7485May 11, 2025
Not the full picture: He plans to donate the majority of his wealth to his foundation, and then wind it down in 20 years. source
Bill Gates Explains His Plans to Close the Gates Foundation in 2045

In a wide-ranging interview, he explains his decision — amid the Trump administration’s assault on foreign aid — to accelerate the end of his giving.

The New York Times
Show threadCrashumbcMay 12, 2025
Bullshit until it happens.
Show threadFeydMay 10, 2025
Unless he actively works towards making billionaires contributing to society non voluntary he is still part of the problem. Billionaires shouldn’t exist in the first place.
Show thread☂️-May 10, 2025
inb4 he “gives it away” to his own charity for tax dodging purposes
Show threadNegativeNullMay 11, 2025
Why There’s No Such Thing as a Good Billionaire
Why There's No Such Thing as a Good Billionaire

In which I break down why billionaire "charity" is terrible for the planet, and why we should stop swallowing their myths.Support my work on Patreon: http://...

YouTube
Show threadinterdimensionalmemeMay 11, 2025
Obvious properity gospel propaganda is obvious Abolish billionnaires, fiscal paradises and inheritance with a monetary value in excess of a lifetime of the median income.
Show threadDataproletMay 10, 2025
He’ll still be a billionaire with the 1 % remaining.
Show threadHailSeitanMay 10, 2025
Can we please not help launder his reputation by proactively giving him credit for something he hasn’t done yet?
Show threadGeetnerdMay 11, 2025

And he hasn’t done shit to help the peasants of the country that made him filthy rich?

Not shitting on the African communities he’s “helped,” but he can afford to help a lot more.

Oh, and he shit on making the CVD-19 vaccine IP free.

Show threadRagingSnarkasmMay 11, 2025
Give it away to a charity you don’t control now, or STFU about it already. We all know you’re still trying to rehab your reputation.
Show threadGeetnerdMay 11, 2025

Carnegie was the smartest of the Robber Barons. He knew what would eventually happen if he didn’t throw the peasants a bone.

He didn’t want a date with Madame Guillotine. And some of the other Robber Barons realized his motive, and the dumber ones just saw it as a competition.

Show threadLibra00May 11, 2025

but I am determined that “he died rich” will not be one of them.

Bill Gates has a net worth of ~$168 billion. Even if this isn’t just PR intended to launder his image, even if he does in fact give away 99% of that, it will still leave him with $1.68 billion dollars. Even if he ups that to 99.99% that’ll still leave him with $16.8 million, which is still rich by anyone’s measure. Bill Gates’ idea of ‘not dying rich’ is radically different than yours or mine; he was never not going to die rich by most peoples’ standards.

Show threadWeirdGoesProMay 11, 2025
That’s true, but to be fair, if he pulls it off it will be one hell of an example to set.
Show threadLibra00May 11, 2025
A better example to set would be to not exploit people to accumulate wealth in the first place. It takes a whole lot of people like you and me staying poor to make Bill Gates that rich.
Show threadWeirdGoesProMay 11, 2025
That’s true. I just appreciate that he seems to do a bit more than Musk to at least keep the appearance of giving back. This still doesn’t get him off the guillotine list.
Show threadLibra00May 11, 2025
I don’t appreciate that one oligarch is better at lying to us than another one, that kinda makes it worse in my mind. Instead of telling ourselves comforting stories about how generous these societal leeches are we should be telling ourselves stories about how much better everyone else’s lives could be if they didn’t exist.
Show threadEcho DotMay 12, 2025

A better example to set would be to not exploit people to accumulate wealth in the first place.

I do that everyday. Everyone feel free to thank me.

Show threadLibra00May 12, 2025
No one gets thanks for being a decent human being, it’s sort of the standard that everyone is expected to hold to.
Show threadEcho DotMay 12, 2025
I would totally exploit people if I actually got the opportunity to do so, it’s just no one will let me do it.
Show threadLibra00May 13, 2025
Then you are not a decent human being? :P
Show threadJadenSmithMay 11, 2025
I’ll believe it when it happens, until then all I hear are promises that could be broken.
Show threadGlobal_LibertyMay 11, 2025

I’m a little surprised that you aren’t aware of the Gates Foundation, which has been the recipient of his largess for years and has done a tremendous about of good.

If he had no track record of true charity, one could be skeptical. However, this is not the case.

Show threadsupersquirrelMay 11, 2025
Way too late to matter you coward
Show threadMTKMay 11, 2025

How nice, live as the 0.0000001% that owns the world and make up most of the big evils in the world from the age of 34 to the age of 70 and then from 70 to 90 transition to the top 0.0001% and “not die rich”

A real sacrifice, what a philanthropist, brave.

I’m just here being a top 25% fully aware of my privilege for being born in a rich country and working in a well paying job, and I still donate more then him in terms of percentage of my net worth. (Bill gates donates about 0.8-1.6% of his net worth annually, I donate about 5-10% annually) and I truly believe that no one should be a billionaire.

Show threadGalacticGrapefruitMay 12, 2025
Me, bottom 10%, making coffee and finding my new pair of pants in a dumpster: Yeah, man, you said it.
Show threaddemonswordMay 12, 2025

Me, bottom 10%

bottom 10% of mankind are most likely starving and homeless, definitely not on lemmy

Show threadSlaxisMay 12, 2025
Assuming they meant in their country, and that their country is USA, bottom 10% as of 2023 was $15-18K. dqydj.com/2023-income-percentile-calculator/
Income Percentile Calculator for the United States in 2023

Below is an individual income percentile calculator for the United States in 2023. Enter pre-tax, gross income earned in full-year 2022 – January to December – to compare to the US individual income distribution. You

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Show threaddemonswordMay 13, 2025

bottom 10% as of 2023 was $15-18K

most likely starving and homeless

Show threadGalacticGrapefruitMay 31, 2025
hehehehe You know, it’s hilarious that you say that. Nobody ever realizes that they’re talking to a starving homeless person on the internet when they meet one, do they?
Show threadSgt_choke_n_strokeMay 11, 2025

He’s donating through his charity to avoid taxes. He will be known as a man that died rich. He has failed, he’ll remembered for Microsoft and hanging with Jeffrey epstein to get a Nobel peace price.

Prove me wrong Billy boy.