Bill Gates tells his foundation to spend it all by 2045
The Gates Foundation received a sort of death sentence today.
Microsoft co-founder and current billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates signalled today that his foundation has just 20 years to drain its bank account and shut up shop.
He has pledged to donate 99% of his fortune, now estimated at a staggering $107 billion, to the foundation. Over the course of the next 20 years of philanthropy, he foresees the foundation spending in excess of $200 billion.
“After making this decision at a moment of contemplation for me,” Gates wrote on his website, Gates Notes. “In addition to celebrating the foundation’s 25th anniversary, this year also celebrates some other milestones:
It would have been the year my father, who helped me start the foundation, would have been 100; Microsoft is turning 50; and I’m turning 70 in October.”
Gates’ gift overall will be the second-largest U.S. philanthropic gift when adjusted for inflation. Warren Buffett, with an estimated net worth of $160 billion, will probably be the largest.
Previously, the Gates Foundation had been told to wind down 20 years after Gates’ death. The 69-year-old Microsoft co-founder appears healthy, so this is a significant shift of the foundation’s timetable.
The 25-year-old Gates Foundation has already given away more than $100 billion in a range of causes that center mainly on health, education, global development, and women’s rights.
Many recipients of the Gates Foundation have been people in poor countries suffering from endemic and often deadly diseases like malariBill Gates tells his foundation to spend it all by 2045.
The statement is made amid the Trump administration’s move to reduce foreign assistance. Trump cut one of the programs that received over $35 billion in congressional appropriations annually. The Gates Foundation said it intends to deploy about $9 billion annually through 2045.
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