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Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

nytimes.com

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Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#51

Post by hvalika »

mikeash wrote: post #47

I don't think I've seen a single positive statement about Zuckerberg's foundation. It would have been 100% fully within his right to simply keep it all, or blow his fortune on snorting Fabergé eggs, or buying classic cars and crashing them. Instead, he's giving almost all of it away. He's choosing to retain control over how it's given away? Well so what! It's still way better than keeping it all. I am no fan of Faceb…

Thank you! People are blowing this whole LLC thing out of control. It really isn't a big deal deal at all. He probably went against the word of his tax advisors to use an LLC as opposed to a typical foundation. Just applaud the man for his efforts and stop turning this into a tax play -- it isn't. Not a very good one at least.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#52

Post by lagudragu »

exhilaration wrote: post #23
whatok wrote: post #2

I don't blame him after what happened in New Jersey.

What exactly happened? From what I hear the money wasn't misused, it just didn't fix things.

In short: Through the Oprah show, Mark donated 100 Million USD to the Newarks Schools to improve education. The end result, however, was the opposite. The students ended up being in a worse position due to corruption and mismanagement within Newarks' Schools abusing the capital injection.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#53

Post by fweespeech »

mikeash wrote: post #47

I don't think I've seen a single positive statement about Zuckerberg's foundation. It would have been 100% fully within his right to simply keep it all, or blow his fortune on snorting Fabergé eggs, or buying classic cars and crashing them. Instead, he's giving almost all of it away. He's choosing to retain control over how it's given away? Well so what! It's still way better than keeping it all. I am no fan of Faceb…

> I am no fan of Facebook, but man, the amount of vitriol coming out about this move just astounds me. Giving away 99% of your wealth is apparently not commendable unless you do it just right. Meanwhile, how much are the commenters themselves giving away? Oh, somewhat less than 99%? Yeah.

I can put 99% of my wealth in a LLC and claim I'm giving it away. that doesn't make it true.

If he was being honest and genuine, it would be in a charitable trust or a non-profit foundation. Unless by "give away" he means "invest in companies and/or political lobbying". [ Hint: Charitable Trusts would function like a LLC in many respects with the guarantee at the end that the money would flow to a charitable cause in the end. ]

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#54

Post by lacksconfidence »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #20
outside1234 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What happened in New Jersey was that Mark was naive.

For those interested, here's a link (I looked it up): http://www.businessinsider.com/we-now-know-more-about-how-ne...

Any accounts of what happened? This used a whole lot of words to say almost nothing. It basically says it didn't work, but didn't go into any details of why beyond a high level complaint about beurocracy

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#56

Post by driverdan »

matt-attack wrote: post #25

I thought it was impossible to donate money (in a tax deductible manner) if you the donor had any direct control of how the money was spent. This was supposed to prevent folks from, say, donating their money to a charity which then sends their own child to college.

The LLC is a for-profit structure. He can do anything he wants with the money.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#57

Post by DanBC »

refurb wrote: post #48
blocktuw wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The trope that minimizing your taxes is good and should be encouraged is tired and political. The reasoning that one isn't breaking any rules is like saying it's ok to take the entire bowl of Halloween candy because there aren't any rules against it. It is against the spirit of taxes which pool resources for the greater good of everyone. Everybody has to pay taxes. Some people have the means to avoid paying a fair am…

Would you argue that taking advantage of your 401k deduction is unfair to everyone else? How about the mortgage interest tax deduction? Deduction for child care? I'm just curious where you draw the line.

Tax planning is fine.

Tax evasion is illegal.

The grey area of tax avoidance - misusing tax laws in ways that were not intended - is not illegal, but not fine. A variety of bizarre corporate structures and dodges are used and the only purpose they serve is to shuffle tax away from government. There's no reason Starbucks has its own coffee bean roasting company that sells its beans at huge price to the Starbucks coffee shops. The only reason it's been structured like that is to funnel tax away from governments where the shops are to the tax haven where the coffee roasting company is.

When a London business, selling products in London, to people in London, buys Google ads from the Google London office, paying for those ads from their London bank account to Google's London bank account in GBP the only reason someone in Ireland rubber stamps the paperwork is so Google can -quite legally- avoid tax.

These are scumbag moves and they create a lot of hostility.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#58

Post by mej10 »

mikeash wrote: post #47

I don't think I've seen a single positive statement about Zuckerberg's foundation. It would have been 100% fully within his right to simply keep it all, or blow his fortune on snorting Fabergé eggs, or buying classic cars and crashing them. Instead, he's giving almost all of it away. He's choosing to retain control over how it's given away? Well so what! It's still way better than keeping it all. I am no fan of Faceb…

Some people just don't want to believe that Zuckerberg is doing something good for the planet -- it means they can't justify their hatred for him as easily anymore.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#59

Post by christoph »

mikeash wrote: post #47

I don't think I've seen a single positive statement about Zuckerberg's foundation. It would have been 100% fully within his right to simply keep it all, or blow his fortune on snorting Fabergé eggs, or buying classic cars and crashing them. Instead, he's giving almost all of it away. He's choosing to retain control over how it's given away? Well so what! It's still way better than keeping it all. I am no fan of Faceb…

The reasons for this are quite simple. When the richest 1% make a very grand gesture like this, there will always be an element of analysis about how they plan to do it, for better or worse.

When it's somebody in the very top 1% who up until now has taken large measures to completely avoid and drastically minimise paying tax in numerous countries (which can have substantial benefits for the populace of said countries) at the levels they should be, questions will always be asked.

I also completely agree, he's fully within his rights to blow the lot - this also has a benefit for society anyway (more people working to build him yachts, supercars, mix him martini's, etc., therefore more collected in tax from said blowing of cash).

I don't have a view at the moment on this either way - the proof will be in the pudding as they say and I will reserve judgement till then. I will, however, say he's not actually given anything away - certainly not yet anyway.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg’s Philanthropy Uses L.L.C. For More Control

#60

Post by CPLX »

mikeash wrote: post #47

I don't think I've seen a single positive statement about Zuckerberg's foundation. It would have been 100% fully within his right to simply keep it all, or blow his fortune on snorting Fabergé eggs, or buying classic cars and crashing them. Instead, he's giving almost all of it away. He's choosing to retain control over how it's given away? Well so what! It's still way better than keeping it all. I am no fan of Faceb…

> he's giving almost all of it away

> He's choosing to retain control

You're aware that those two things are opposites right?

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