That isn’t even a low bar. That’s the complete absence of a bar.
There are no immanently “good” billionaires or even multi-millionaires. The only feature having the distinction of monetary wealth correctly connotes is a
hoarding problem which capitalism waives as such.
Philanthropy for the multi-millionaire or billionaire is
a kind of laundering, and with it comes enabling kickbacks (tax deductions and breaks being the implicit driver) which serve the private self-interest of the philanthropist via their public gestures of benevolence.
Points taken except that in the back of my mind I'll never be ungrateful for the existence of some of the results of outsized philanthropic gestures, even if they were about laundering money, or at least trying to offset public distaste for how rich guys made their dough.
Personally I'm able to separate how I feel about a CEO having a thumb on the competition and hauling off a fat share of the company's profits, versus how I feel about the existence of a medical facility or a library or museum into which that deep-pocketed person dumps some of that too much dough.
It's the wealthy individual's choice within the law to do whatever he wants with his disposable funds. Whether the laws should be how they are is another question. A further question of course is how much of law is written for the upper crust to begin with, or enforced with a wrist slap to the rich later on if a law is broken and proves inconvenient.
Now to me it seems true, as some will argue, that most plain Americans are not going to avail themselves of a particular symphony hall or hospital wing or an art museum, and so by the extremely wealthy not paying their fair share of taxes, they end up with dough to spend "philanthropically" that in fact may only benefit other pretty wealthy people. I mean not that many of us land in box seats in some orchestra hall on a regular basis, right? If higher taxes were paid instead by these wealthy individuals, it's possible every American might benefit by how we ourselves ---through our elected officials in Congress-- might decide to spend that money.
And It's also true that "no good deed goes unpunished". So for instance, even with the acknowledged beneficial impact that money from Bill Gates and his wife have made in reducing deaths from malaria, AIDS and TB in countries of sub-Saharan Africa, it's been noted that there are "unintended victims" of that largesse , in that the Gates-funded efforts can end up negatively disrupting overall function of healthcare facilities and their resources.
Donations to fight AIDS, TB and malaria in Africa have inadvertently put many of those with other basic healthcare needs at risk.
www.latimes.com
Still, I see more public benefit to what Gates has done with his monies pumped into that foundation versus what Bezos has done with some well-publicized philanthropic grants made just in advance of his privatized suborbital space adventure...
Jeff Bezos will donate $200 million to the Smithsonian—its largest donation since James Smithsonian’s founding gift in 1846. Meanwhile, a Bezos company foundation awarded $1 million grants to 19 nonprofits. All gifts were announced six days ahead of Bezos’ trip to space, which is scheduled to...
www.nonprofitpro.com
These guys are always going to do something with a chunk of their money besides just pass it on to heirs. That at least some of it ends up in the public square is a plus. That more of it could end up in the public square if we insisted that Congress revisit "tax reform", well... that's up to the voters.
