When Jeff Bezos divorced McKenzie Scott in 2019, she received 4 percent of Amazon shares, valued then at $36 billion. She determined that she wanted to give her staggering wealth away. In the past 11 months, she has donated more than $8 billion as direct gifts to nonprofits.
None of the recipients asked for the money. None expected it. They were selected by Scott’s team, and out of the blue, got a phone call informing them about their good fortune. One of her trusted advisors is her new husband, Dan Jewett, who teaches chemistry at her children’s school.
In 2020, she gave away nearly $6 billion to 500 organizations. She just revealed that she donated another $2.74 billion to 286 organizations. The average size of the grants was about $10 million. Her grants come with no strings attached, unlike “gifts” from the Gates Foundation, the Broad Foundation, the Walton Family Foundation, and many other venture philanthropists. The recipients can use the money as they see fit.
Read her statement in Medium, where she makes clear her disdain for the system that creates vast inequality. Her article also lists the organizations that received her surprise grants.
She writes, in part:
People struggling against inequities deserve center stage in stories about change they are creating. This is equally — perhaps especially — true when their work is funded by wealth. Any wealth is a product of a collective effort that included them. The social structures that inflate wealth present obstacles to them. And despite those obstacles, they are providing solutions that benefit us all.
Putting large donors at the center of stories on social progress is a distortion of their role. Me, Dan, a constellation of researchers and administrators and advisors — we are all attempting to give away a fortune that was enabled by systems in need of change. In this effort, we are governed by a humbling belief that it would be better if disproportionate wealth were not concentrated in a small number of hands, and that the solutions are best designed and implemented by others. Though we still have a lot to learn about how to act on these beliefs without contradicting and subverting them, we can begin by acknowledging that people working to build power from within communities are the agents of change. Their service supports and empowers people who go on to support and empower others.
Despite her determination to give her fortune away, Amazon’s stock price has soared because of the pandemic. Scott’s fortune is now valued at $60 billion. She will have to give her billions away faster. Much faster.
McKenzie Scott seems to understand that our current economic system is unjust. We need a wealth tax to correct the insane inequality that now characterizes our society.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It’s great that she donates to community colleges instead of naming a building after herself.
I still think we should start taxing the ultra-wealthy though.
I think she would agree about taxing the ultra-wealthy more.
Good for McKenzie Scott. Acknowledging up front that she has this vast wealth because of a system that needs to be changed, and making a statement about what real charity is. She isn’t imposing her will on groups, just allowing them to carry on with the work they are doing.
Could not be more different than the ed reform billionaires who plaster their name all over using “charitable funds” to people who are paid to advocate for the change they want.
Ms. Scott understands that many of the wealthy like her EX. have climbed to the top by paying lower wages to those that actually do the labor. Our rigged economy enables the super-wealthy to amass super fortunes and pay little to no taxes. Maybe it’s time for us to consider Warren’s wealth tax plan.
Scott did her research on the organizations that received funding. Scott understands the importance of the arts. A large part of her donation went to cultural organizations. Many other the donations were designed to help under served groups including some public community colleges that serve communities of color.
Ms. Scott has demonstrated what real philanthropy should be, a generous gift without strings or special interests attached. Bezos and his $28 million dollar space tourist may take a short, frivolous ride into space while McKenzie Scott is trying to make a difference right here on earth.
“a generous gift without strings or special interests attached”
The control aspect of the billionaire “gifts” are the worst part of it.
Why should Priscilla Chan be directing public school policy? She’s a physician. There are lots of physicians. The one and only reason she has such an outsized say in public school policy is that she donates money and hires people who agree with her.
The Walton Family now design publicly-funded workplace training policy. I didn’t elect them and I don’t want them running public schools and vocational programs. I don’t care that they have tens of billions of dollars and buy their way into power. I don’t think that’s a qualification.
The deference shown by lawmakers to these people is embarrassing. They basically grovel at their feet. It makes me ashamed that we in the public have allowed this.
How can we claim to be a meritocracy when the only qualification required to direct public policy is vast sums of money?
yes, and now we are so deeply embedded in years of praise for “Philanthro-captialism” and “Venture philanthropy”
One of the big claims in ed reform is public school supporters are “self interested”. All public school advocacy is dismissed as “self interested” so therefore invalid, so we get no advocacy on behalf of public schools or public school students.
Are billionaires self interested? When the Waltons completely capture US education and labor policy are they acting in their own self interest? Why isn’t that even a possibility? Why do they get this elaborate deference and no criticism or real analysis? Because they put all the people who would be critics on the payroll of the “foundations” and purchased them too?
Public school supporters advocating for public school students = self interested so therefore invalid
Billionaires funding and directing US public education policy = wholly for the good
It’s just nonsense.
This is from the national charter school conference:
“Charter Schools, Congress, and the Biden Administration: Big Tent or Big No
COVID relief, facilities funding, accountability, the Charter Schools Program, new civil rights policies: how will congress and the administration impact charter schools this year? What are the top threats and opportunities, and how can you help?
Speakers: Sunil Mansukhani, The Raben Group; Christine Wolfe, National Alliance for Public Charter Schools”
They lobby for charter schools. There’s no evaluation at all of how federal policy might impact children who attend public schools. It’s evaluated exclusively thru the lens of how it benefits charter schools and charter school students.
Shouldn’t public school students and families have advocates who evaluate federal policy on how it impacts public schools? Why is it okay to have charter schools lobbying for charter schools and private schools lobbying for vouchers but NOT okay to have public school advocates working for public schools?
If public school supporters can’t advocate on behalf of public schools who will? The charter lobby? The voucher lobby? Of course not.
So what ed reformers are really saying is we can have advocates for charter schools and we can have advocates for vouchers but we may NOT have advocates for public schools.
Why would public schools accept that? It’s obviously and blatantly biased towards the charter and private schools ed reformers prefer and promote.
“Charter Schools, Congress, and the Biden Administration: Big Tent or Big No”
I suppose the silver lining is that if Trump had won, the title would be:
“Charter Schools, Congress and the Trump Administration: How do we get even more from our generous friends who control the federal government?”
And of course, if Trump had won, the really “controversial” topic would be “Is it enough to have our generous friends who control the federal government increase their funding 1,000 fold, or should we also be demanding that public school budgets be cut in half due to their wasteful spending and lack of success with the students we dump?” No doubt the “good” folks would say that public school budgets only need to be cut by 25%, while others say just eliminate public schools altogether, and the false notion that those are the only 2 choices would be reported by the so-called liberal media and given legitimacy as the only choices.
Looking through the list of organizations she donated to, I did not see any charter school chains. That’s refreshing. There were some organizations on the list that partner with the Ballmer Group and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. That is a potential problem. Overall, however, her philosophy of philanthropy seems to be one of donating to people in need instead of using grants to monetize people in their moments of weakness. Overall, she seems to have not been infected by the mental disease afflicting most tech billionaires. I wonder if there are clues to a cure for them in her immune system.
“I wonder if there are clues to a cure for them in her immune system.” Brilliant. Although unfortunately I don’t think there is a cure, only a treatment that alleviates the symptoms (taxing them at the rate they were during Eisenhower).
I don’t think I would call what ed reform philanthropists do as “using grants to monetize people in their moments of weakness”. I’d call it using grants to push exactly the agenda that the billionaires want, by supporting new non-profits that push whatever agenda the billionaires want.
Taxation could prevent spread and ameliorate the most virulent symptoms.
Education Trust is on the list. I don’t know why because they get millions from Gates and other “reformers.” They are passionately in favor of standardized testing. Their president, John King, succeededArne Duncan in Obama’s last year. The one thing EdTrust does not lack is money.
EdTrust was one I was referring to. There was also one called Third Sector with plenty of reformy meritocracy language on its site, described changing government as its mission, and listed partnership with Steve Ballmer. Ballmer is definitely on the naughty list. Everything with part of Third Way’s name draws my suspicious attention. That’s a thinktank gone wrong. Should be called Third Rail.
I wonder if she will give it all away, every dime, or keep a few million.
Got to be able to gas up the private jet.
I don’t begrudge someone having a private jet. But someone can maintain a private jet for 100 years, and still have plenty of money left to buy and maintain his 3 mansions, his 7 cars and the rest of his fabulous (but to some people, bare minimum) lifestyle if he “only” has 999 million dollars. The extraordinary greed of the people who believe their rights would be infringed if the country whose historic higher tax policies created the infrastructure for them to earn that wealth taxed them higher is astonishing.
Sure they can go to Russia or someone else where billionaires are catered to and live a low tax life. And they can pray that the people in power don’t decide they want their wealth.
Warren Buffett gets it to some degree. He wouldn’t suffer one bit by paying higher taxes.
When the US had fewer very rich people, they were embarrassed enough to build icons to themselves that helped other people. Carnegie Libraries and Carnegie Museums. The Rockefeller Foundation. Separately they tried to influence government, but they didn’t pretend their desire to influence government to act in ways most beneficial to them was “charity”.
Speaking about private forces vs. public commons:
https://preaprez.wordpress.com/2021/06/16/the-afts-weingarten-sells-out-new-york-teachers-in-defense-of-heath-care-privatization/
Weingarten is wrong. I don’t know why she would support that.
Some people might look at what Weingarten is supporting and start amplifying the narrative that supporting the union versus supporting those who want to destroy the union altogether is a choice between the lesser of two evils. As an outsider, I can see that there is a huge difference between those two “evils”, and empowering one side – those who want to destroy unions altogether – will make it much harder for teachers in the union to get more progressive policies. So rather than call the choice to support unions a choice to support “the lesser of two evils”, I believe a more truthful characterization would be a choice between one evil and one flawed entity that can be pressured into being better if people work hard enough to do so. Is it really going to help union members if the public believes even union members characterize the union as “evil”, and will they really pay attention to the “lesser of two evils” instead of just rightly understanding that even the union members know the union is evil.
As an outsider, I don’t know why the union isn’t led by more progressive folks. But I don’t think those who say “Don’t vote to have teachers unions because they are just the lesser of two evils” really have the best interests of teachers in mind. The union is flawed, its leadership has flaws, but choosing to support unions versus choosing to support those who want to ban unions is not a choice between the lesser of two evils. It is a choice between having a union that can be pressured into being better, and not having a union at all.
If he didn’t have billions, Democratic Illinois Governor JB Pritzker would have lost to Republican Ex-Governor Bruce Rauner, in 2018. 🤔
Ex-Governor Bruce Rauner was also a billionaire. So this what our democracy has turned into. It takes a billionaire to beat a billionaire. Or it takes a candidate funded by billionaires to defeat another candidate funded by billionaires.