Seattle – Seattle (AP) – Bill Gates He says that he will donate 99% of his remaining technological fortune to the Gates Foundationwhich will now close in 2045, earlier than planned. Today, that would be worth an estimated value of $ 107 billion.
The promise is among the largest philanthropic gifts in history, overcoming the historical contributions of industrialists such as John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie when they fit inflation. Only Berkshire Hathaway Warren Buffett’s investor’s commitment to donate your fortune – Currently estimated by Forbes at $ 160 billion, it can be greater depending on the fluctuations of the stock market.
The Donation of Gates will be delivered over time and will allow the GASTE Foundation for $ 200 billion in the next 20 years.
“It is a bit exciting to have so much to be able to put in these causes,” Gates said in an interview with Associated Press.
Your announcement on Thursday indicates a promise of sustained support for these causes, particularly global health and Education in the United Statesand an eventual end of the immense world influence of the Foundation. Gates says that spending his fortune will help save and improve many lives now, which will have positive domain effects beyond the closure of the foundation. It also makes it more likely that their intentions will be honored.
“I think 20 years is the correct balance between giving everything possible to advance these things and give a lot of warning to the people that now this money will have gone,” Gates said.
The Gates Foundation has been without equal between the bases, attracting supporters and detractors, but also numerous unfounded conspiracy theories.
In addition to the $ 100 billion he has spent since its foundation 25 years ago, he has directed scientific research, helped develop new technologies and promoted long -term associations with countries and companies.
About 41% of the money of the foundation so far comes from Warren Buffett and the rest of the fortune doors made in Microsoft.
Started by Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates in 2000, the Foundation plays an important role in the configuration of the global health policy and has forged a special niche by associating with companies to reduce the cost of medical treatments so that low and medium income countries can afford.
“The work of the Foundation has been much more shocking than I expected,” Gates said, calling him his second and last career.
The influence of the Global Health Foundation, from the World Health Organization to research agendas, is both a measure of its success and a magnet for criticism. For years, researchers have asked why a rich family should have as many things about how the world improves people’s health and responds to crises.
Gates said that, like any private citizen, he can choose how to spend the money he earns and has decided to do everything possible to reduce childhood deaths.
“Is that bad? It is not an important cause? People can criticize it,” he said, but the base will adhere to his global health work.
Associated Press receives financial support for the coverage of news in Africa of the Gates Foundation and for the cover of women’s news in the workforce and the state of the Organization of Melinda French Gates, Pivotal Ventures.
The most precious metric of the Foundation is the fall in childhood deaths due to preventable causes in almost half between 2000 and 2020, according to United Nations Figures. The CEO of the Foundation, Mark Suzman, is careful to say that they are not attributed by this achievement. But he believes they had a “catalytic role”, for example, in helping to deliver vaccines to children through Gavi, the vaccine alliance that helped create.
The foundation still has numerous objectives: eradicate polyomyelitis, control other mortal diseases, such as malaria and reduce malnutrition, which makes children more vulnerable to other diseases.
Gates hopes that when spending to address these problems now, rich donors will be free to address other problems later.
The Gates Foundation had planned to end two decades after Gates’ death, which means that today’s announcement significantly increases that schedule. Gates plans to stay compromised, although at 69, he acknowledged that he might not say.
In its remaining two decades, the Foundation will maintain a budget of around $ 9 billion a year, which represents a leveling of its almost annual growth since 2006, when Buffett began to donate.
Suzman expects the Foundation to limit its approach to the main priorities.
“Having that temporary horizon and resources simply put an even greater burden to say:” Are you really putting your resources, your thumb, about what will be the biggest and most successful bets instead of dispersing it too much? “Suzman said, what he acknowledged was to create uncertainty even within the base on what programs they would continue.
The important changes preceded the 25th year of the Foundation.
In 2021, Melinda French Gates and Bill Gates divorced and buffet He resigned as Foundation Administrator. They recruited a New Board of Trustees To help govern the Foundation, and in 2024, the French doors left to continue working in their own organization.
French Gates said he decided to resign in part to concentrate on counteracting the reversal of women’s rights in the United States in the Elle Women of Impact In New York in April, he said he wanted to leave the foundation at a higher point.
“I trusted Mark Suzman, the current CEO,” he said. “We had a board in its place that I helped put in its place, and knew its values.”
Even when the governance of the foundation stabilizes, the way ahead seems difficult. Durable conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza, global economic agitation and cuts to foreign aid predict less resources that reach global health and development.
“The greatest uncertainty for us is the generosity that will go to global health,” Gates said. “Will it continue to go down as if I had the last years or can we return to where it should be?”
Even facing these obstacles, the doors and the spoke foundation, as they often do, with optimism, pointing out the innovations that have financed or ways in which they have helped reduce the cost of attention.
“It’s amazing to find these low cost and tragic things if we can’t take them all who need them,” Gates said. “Therefore, it will require renewing that commitment of those who are well to help those who have the greatest need.”
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