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Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

cmu.edu

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Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#31

Post by bostonpete »

ehsanu1 wrote: post #25
testcock1 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What surprised me even more was that it was only the 14th largest donation in history made to higher education. Here's the list if anyone else was wondering: http://chronicle.com/stats/big_gifts.htm

That list is slightly outdated, missing the $10b endowment for the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (endowed by its namesake). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Abdullah_University_of_Sci...

An endowment of a public university by a king seems like a far cry from a "private donation" (which that list presents) to me...

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#32

Post by bluekeybox »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #29
schmittz wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People have a horrible misunderstanding of libertarianism. Libertarians believe people should be absolutely free to do what they want with their money. Libertarianism is not a fancy word for narcissistic hedonism. From a philosophical standpoint, libertarians should welcome charity/philanthropy as it is a free market solution to dealing with society's problems. They are merely against forced charity (i.e. welfare, me…

Except that libertarianism is rife with narcissistic hedonists. A subset to be sure.

And the other *isms are rife with moralizers and bottom-dwellers. A subset to be sure.

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#33

Post by CapitalistCartr »

0x12 wrote: post #24
[deleted] wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

No grudge, it just seemed as though giving an amount like that without any expectation of a return was not exactly a libertarian thing to do. As for not knowing what your position is, that's correct but it's a safe bet that you are not a in position to match his donation. Feel free to surprise me ;)

That's not libertarianism. Libertarianism strongly supports private charity; it's government charity it's opposed to. Private charity is how it's supposed to work.

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#34

Post by sp332 »

threpinatoy wrote: post #27
ehsanu1 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That list is slightly outdated, missing the $10b endowment for the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (endowed by its namesake). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Abdullah_University_of_Sci...

Does a large endowment incentivize murder?

I'm sure the document has a clause which invalidates the donation if they murder him for the money.

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#35

Post by dmv »

cschmidt wrote: post #11
ahi wrote: post #6

According to Wikipedia, CMU currently has an endowment of $815m so rather huge donation. I was actually surprised by this. For some reason I thought CMU had one of those endowments where $250m gets a urinal named after you.

I'm a CMU alum, and I asked about that once when they were mentioning "space naming opportunities". Very roughly and unofficially speaking, $50,000 gets you a classroom, $1,000,000 gets you a floor or wing, and $20 million gets you a department. Apparently $265 million gets you a college.

$55 million (Tepper) in 2003 was the previous price...

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#36

Post by pilom »

epenn wrote: post #22

I was originally going to post that sometimes I wish gifts like this would be given to smaller, less fortunate schools. A top tier school like CMU is always going to be able to find new sources of endowment. I still believe this in general. However before reading the previous comments, I had no idea how small CMU's endowment was compared to other top tier universities. If the numbers I read are correct, CMU's $815 mi…

CMU made some very big announcements (big to students at the school) in 2007 when their endowment broke $1 billion for the first time ever. And then 2008 happened.

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#37

Post by pilom »

cschmidt wrote: post #11
ahi wrote: post #6

According to Wikipedia, CMU currently has an endowment of $815m so rather huge donation. I was actually surprised by this. For some reason I thought CMU had one of those endowments where $250m gets a urinal named after you.

I'm a CMU alum, and I asked about that once when they were mentioning "space naming opportunities". Very roughly and unofficially speaking, $50,000 gets you a classroom, $1,000,000 gets you a floor or wing, and $20 million gets you a department. Apparently $265 million gets you a college.

The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation donated $20-40 million and got a building.

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#38

Post by pilom »

flavoredpork wrote: post #13
ahi wrote: post #6

According to Wikipedia, CMU currently has an endowment of $815m so rather huge donation. I was actually surprised by this. For some reason I thought CMU had one of those endowments where $250m gets a urinal named after you.

CMU has an extraordinarily low endowment. They were not hit as bad during the economic collapse and resulting recession.

Mayber they "were not hit as bad" in absolute dollars but their endowment was over $1 billion in early 2008. 20% seems like a pretty darn big hit to me.

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#39

Post by onan_barbarian »

bluekeybox wrote: post #5

Wow, just looked at his book, "In the Shadow of the Rising Sun: The Political Roots of American Economic Decline" (published in 1991, at the time when Japan was today's China...), and this guy is about as far away from my libertarian worldview as you can imagine. He believed that America's problem at the time was that it didn't have enough bureaucracy (which is especially ironic given how bureaucratic gerontocracy to…

Well played, sir. A fine and timely rebuttal! Less courageous souls might choose to pick on older material - say from the 60s or 70s - so as not to be accused of carefully picking out material that can be dealt with through the magic of hindsight, but not you.

I will keep a keen eye out for further highly relevant dispatches from your "libertarian worldview" on other recent events, such as Operation Desert Storm, the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the release of not one but two Use Your Illusion albums from Guns 'n' Roses, and the release of the SNES gaming system.

Re: Bill Dietrich gives CMU $250,000,000

#40

Post by cschmidt »

dmv wrote: post #35
cschmidt wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a CMU alum, and I asked about that once when they were mentioning "space naming opportunities". Very roughly and unofficially speaking, $50,000 gets you a classroom, $1,000,000 gets you a floor or wing, and $20 million gets you a department. Apparently $265 million gets you a college.

$55 million (Tepper) in 2003 was the previous price...

Well, you expect the b-school to cost more than other departments, don't you :-).
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