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My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

gatesnotes.com

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Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#231

Post by dekrg »

gambiting wrote: post #179
dekrg wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and Bill Gates is such a good guy that he even remained friends with Jeffrey Epstein after Epstein's conviction. To help children of course. Truly a Bill Gates is a true hero looking out for all the children.

Do you have any details on the exact nature of their relationship, so we can read up on it?

You mean aside his wife divorcing him over his relationship with Epstein and it being widely reported in the news? I guess we will never know if Epstein and Gates even knew each other.

For anyone actually curious and unaware there are plenty of new articles that talk about Gates and Epstein, it's not some hidden secret. However it's a topic those who like Gates philanthropy like to ignore and pretend it doesn't exist as can be seen in this thread.

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#232

Post by ok123456 »

mgraczyk wrote: post #197
prvc wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have to disagree about the 'effective' part. Gates seems to have had a knack for massive inefficiencies and negative externalities in every way that he has impacted the world. Think of how many man-hours (measured in human lifetimes) have been wasted due to the shortcomings of various MicroSoft programs. Weigh that against his health initiatives in the third world. Or the impact of dimming the sun by depositing massi…

Helping to cure polio doesn't outweigh imagined future harms by George engineering that didn't happen yet?

He's not curing polio, though. His polio program is spreading it because they use a live virus, and a low percentage of the population is getting it. People are now getting paralytic polio from others who got the vaccine.

This is just one example of the Kreuger-Dunning that permeates all aspects of the Gates Foundation. His interventions have been mainly disasters, distorted public policy, and gobbled up biotech IP in the process. He controls the money spicket and is very petty and cocksure about what is "right." Researchers and public policy experts who disagree with his ideas get cut off.

Governments should set public health policy and manage the needs of their people, not billionaires, biotech companies, or NGOs.

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#233

Post by hiuyty »

wing-_-nuts wrote: post #39

His foundation really does seem to do a good job with 'effective altruism'. There's a reason they're marked as secondary beneficiaries on all my accounts. Also, as a recommendation, you guys should look into whether your employer matches charitable donations to 501Cs in any amount. I find giving a solid chunk of my discretionary budget to charity every year lends a sense of purpose to a job that wouldn't otherwise ha…

[flagged]

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#234

Post by oulipo »

skandium wrote: post #48

One of the great tragedies of the world is that while he is arguably the philanthropist with the highest positive impact in human history, a significant part of the population seems to still think he is the literal Antichrist.

I'm not sure he's actually the philanthropist with the "highest positive impact", when looking at the "net value"

he's "extorted" a lot of money from various states by locking and price-gouging, money that would have otherwise been spent on social projects

basically he has done

Gates -> extort money -> fantastic personal wealth -> gave back to organization *he* decides to give too

while the normal path would be

Governments and people have lower spending because they don't need to give Microsoft too much cash -> governments and people decide by themselves how to spend extra money -> there are more, and more diversified, humanitarian actions

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#235

Post by neilv »

nicce wrote: post #203
jayd16 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We could also decide to live in a society that doesn't allow for such runaway wealth consolidation we need the robber barons' hand-outs to do good. C'est la vie.

We could, but we haven't yet figured it out how to.

Sure you can. You have an equitable society, and when someone inevitably tries to take more than their share (because there will always be sociopaths), you make them stop.

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#236

Post by 999900000999 »

bombcar wrote: post #180
999900000999 wrote: post #133

>The Gates Foundation’s mission remains rooted in the idea that where you are born should not determine your opportunities. Arguably he's already done so much for billions of people. Had typing on computers not became the main way businesses communicate , anyone with bad, handwriting would be stuck in menial work. When I was growing up in the 90s my hand writing was so bad it was assumed I would never amount to anyth…

In no way would I want to downplay Gates' effect on the industry (though I personally think it was much more in the 80s and early 90s than in the heyday of the 2000s) I think people would have built computers without him, and its possible that we would have been better off overall in a world where the Amiga won, not the IBM PC, or the Mac, etc. Gates is more notable for NOT Netscaping or Sunning or Lotus-123ing his c…

I don't see computers being widely adapted without Microsoft deciding to essentially give Windows away to OEMs.

Of course this was anti competitive, but it was a massive net good.

The point is computers became extremely cheap. We're at the point where you can get a used laptop for 100$, install Linux on it and write code to your hearts content. The only thing limiting you is your own skill set.

I don't think computers become affordable without Microsoft

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#237

Post by queuebert »

skandium wrote: post #48

One of the great tragedies of the world is that while he is arguably the philanthropist with the highest positive impact in human history, a significant part of the population seems to still think he is the literal Antichrist.

I didn't realize Xerox had so many employees.

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#238

Post by [deleted] »

hiuyty wrote: post #233
wing-_-nuts wrote: post #39

His foundation really does seem to do a good job with 'effective altruism'. There's a reason they're marked as secondary beneficiaries on all my accounts. Also, as a recommendation, you guys should look into whether your employer matches charitable donations to 501Cs in any amount. I find giving a solid chunk of my discretionary budget to charity every year lends a sense of purpose to a job that wouldn't otherwise ha…

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#239

Post by newsclues »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #112
RataNova wrote: post #33

How much power is concentrated in the hands of individuals... It's great that Gates is choosing to use that power philanthropically, but it also raises questions about the long-term role of private wealth in solving public problems.

When the government doesn't do it, private parties have to; when there's a significant percentage of the population voting for "small government" parties, more responsibility goes to (wealthy) individuals.

If the government do it, because they are lobbied not to, so that private parties (with lobbyists) can, there is potential moral hazard.

Re: My new deadline: 20 years to give away virtually all my wealth

#240

Post by gambiting »

dekrg wrote: post #231
gambiting wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any details on the exact nature of their relationship, so we can read up on it?

You mean aside his wife divorcing him over his relationship with Epstein and it being widely reported in the news? I guess we will never know if Epstein and Gates even knew each other. For anyone actually curious and unaware there are plenty of new articles that talk about Gates and Epstein, it's not some hidden secret. However it's a topic those who like Gates philanthropy like to ignore and pretend it doesn't exist…

>>You mean aside his wife divorcing him over his relationship with Epstein

She divorced him over Gates cheating, not over the relationship with Epstein - if I'm wrong please correct me.

>>like to ignore and pretend it doesn't exist

I honestly don't want to, like the other commented said "just google" - so I "just googled" and none of the articles I found suggest they had anything beyond a very superficial relationship where they met a few times. Again, if I'm wrong please correct me.

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