Amazon’s Jeff Bezos is now Richest Person in Modern History
Jeff Bezos was named the richest man in modern history on Monday when his fortune hit the US$150 billion (FJ$317.14bn) mark, surpassing Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.
Mr Gates ranks second in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, trailing Mr Bezos by roughly US$55bn (FJ$116.28bn).
When adjusted for inflation, Mr Bezos is still worth more than Mr Gates was at the peak of the dot-com boom.
But he has not engaged in philanthropy (at least publicly) to the same extent as many other billionaires.
Several billionaires have taken up philanthropic causes while serving in executive roles, including Tesla chief executive officer Elon Musk and Netflix Inc. CEO Reed Hastings.
Both of these CEOs have signed the Giving Pledge, committing to donate a majority of their fortune to charity during their lifetime or in their will.
Mr Bezos is the only American in Bloomberg’s ranking of the world’s top five richest people to not join the pledge.
Twitter request
In June 2017, however, he requested input from his Twitter followers for creating a short-term philanthropy strategy.
“I’m thinking I want much of my philanthropic activity to be helping people in the here and now — short term — at the intersection of urgent need and lasting impact,” Mr Bezos wrote.
He cited the example of Mary’s Place in Seattle, which provides shelter and employment training to people who are homeless. Amazon partnered with Mary’s Place in 2016, turning an old hotel into a shelter for more than 200 family members. That space was later demolished to make room for two new Amazon office towers, but the company committed to giving Mary’s Place a permanent home.
Mr Bezos himself has donated US$1 million (FJ$2.11m) to the nonprofit.
Last month, a few days before the one-year anniversary of his Twitter request, Mr Bezos tweeted that people’s responses were “inspiring, thoughtful, helpful, and appreciated.”
Mr Bezos said he has chosen two areas to focus on and intends to make an announcement by the end of this summer.
Bezos criticised
In a letter to Mr Bezos published in Forbes, philanthropy adviser Jake Hayman criticised the billionaire’s focus on short-term solutions and his decision to seek suggestions on Twitter.
“The answer is not to provide shelter and employment services to homeless families everywhere but instead to fix the systems that have consistently and repeatedly failed people to the point at which they rely on charity,” Hayman wrote.
Mathias Döpfner, the CEO of Business Insider’s parent company, Axel Springer, sat down with Mr Bezos in April for an interview that revealed more details about the billionaire’s thought process for future philanthropy.
During the interview, Mr Bezos said he is interested in addressing transient homelessness and helping people without family or a support system.
“You only have to help them for six to nine months,” Mr Bezos said.
“You get them trained. You get them a job. They are perfectly productive members of society.”
NGO support
Mr Bezos did not announce any large donations immediately after his Twitter request, but in January, he and his wife said they had given US$33m (FJ$69.77m) to the nonprofit TheDream.US, which provides support to children who came to the United States as undocumented immigrants. The money is being used to finance college scholarships for 1,000 high school graduates who were granted stay in the US under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals programme.
The co-founder of TheDream.US is Don Graham, who was the publisher of The Washington Post when Mr Bezos bought the newspaper in 2013.
In the donation announcement, Mr Bezos said the gift was made in honour of his father, who came to the US from Cuba in the 1960s as one of thousands of unaccompanied children.
Although billionaires like Mr Musk and Mr Hastings have engaged in philanthropy to a greater extent than Mr Bezos, some notably charitable billionaires didn’t get as involved while running their companies. Microsoft co-founder Mr Gates, for example, did not create the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which has more than US$40bn (FJ$84.57bn) in its endowment, until after stepping down as CEO of his company.