Jeff Bezos’ foundation gave $5 million to expand homeless shelters in Florida. Bezos has assets of about $200 billion. There are many thoughts swirling in my head about this gift. Like, should Bezos have given more? To him, $5 million is pocket change. Should he have underwritten an expansion of affordable housing instead of expanding shelters? And more. Like, what are the consequences of online shopping replacing brick-and-mortar stores? Why is Jeff’s ex-wife McKenzie Scott so much more generous in her philanthropy than he is?
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ philanthropic fund has donated $5 million to the Coalition for the Homeless of Central Florida, which will use the money to expand its existing shelter and support its family outreach program.
This is the second time Bezos’ Day One Fund has supported the coalition. In 2021, the nonprofit received a $2.5 million grant.
“With the increase in individuals and families struggling with homelessness, specifically because of this affordable housing crisis, being able to utilize this grant to help those families who are unsheltered is huge for us,” said Trinette Nation, director of development for the coalition.
The Bezos Day One Fund is a $2 billion fund started in 2018 by the Amazon billionaire and his then wife, MacKenzie Scott, to support homeless families.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Diane: Well, considering the wave of Orwellian double-speak that flows from the Trump side of the equation, “homeless shelters” is probably a euphemism for “holding camps” for undocumented detainees (jails). I speculate, however.
BTW, the runup to hard-edged fascism is the now-common use of behind-the-scenes goon-intimidators (like the brownshirts in Nazi Germany) who increasingly terrorize (and then begin to “disappear”) witnesses, poll workers, and people like Liz Cheney and those in Congress . . . who don’t want to hand the United States over to the likes of “Little Leonard Leo” (the “mischief elf”) and his selected band of mega-billionaires, or to Musk, who in fact are colonizing the people of America while, know it or not, also flirting with those hard-edges of fascism. CBK
(The quotations above are from an interview on Lawrence McDonald’s show with Sheldon Whitehouse on 12-24-24.)
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I’m feeling just as cynical, Catherine. I’m guessing that most of Florida’s homeless are not from European stock.
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Scott’s donation comes from a sense of trying to help those that are less fortunate. Bezos’ donation is a token gesture. Bezos will easily gain a lot more by simply moving to Florida where there is no income tax. Musk is considering buying a condo in West Palm Beach. Florida is a mecca for greedy oligarchs and other assorted right wing extremists. https://www.forbes.com/sites/phoebeliu/2024/12/18/how-billionaire-amazon-founder-jeff-bezos-saved-taxes-this-year-florida/
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Musk is building a hyper-secure compound in Texas for his wives and children. Low taxes there. And reverence for the morbidly rich.
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He’ll use the condo to entertain his new lady friends when he comes to Florida to manipulate Trump at Mar-a-Lago.
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That’s a generous .000025% of his wealth!
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Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think these nonprofit organizations that billionaires launch, like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and Bezos Day One Fund, by law, must give away a minimum percentage of the total invested in the so-called non profit fund annually to non profits like this Florida homeless shelter to avoid paying taxes on the profits from the rest of the money in the fund that are invested in stocks and/or profitable ventures.
Those profits flow in like a flood while the donations trickle out.
Explain how the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation makes more money than the donations it awards annually and keeps growing inside that tax shelter.
That scam seems to have backfired on Elon Musk because he has trouble giving any of his money to nonprofits that help the homeless and poor.
“New tax filings show that the Musk Foundation fell $421 million short of the amount it was required to give away in 2023. Now, Mr. Musk has until the end of the year to distribute that money, or he will be required to pay a sizable penalty to the Internal Revenue Service.” SOURCE: New York Times, Dec 12, 2024
The convicted rapist, fraud and felony had to close down his tax shelter scam because most if not all of his donations recycled back to him in some way.
Donald The John Trump Pays Court-Ordered $2 Million For Illegally Using Trump Foundation Funds
https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/2019/donald-j-trump-pays-court-ordered-2-million-illegally-using-trump-foundation
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That’s only $635 million shy of what he’s spending on his upcoming wedding.
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While I agree with all that is said about Bezos and our Mega Billionaires. The concern for displacement of Retail Workers is misguided. The highly skilled carriage maker of the Horse and Buggy era was replaced by the unskilled production line worker at Fords Auto plants . The job so tedious that Nazi lover Ford was forced to raise wages . Not to enable those workers to buy a Model T. as the myth goes. But he could not keep employees on the production. Like at Amazon worker turnover was extreme. Even those raises were not enough. The Great Depression created the circumstances to pass the NLRA as Union Representation grew to 30+ % of the workforce the re- distributive power of Unions made dirty filthy Jobs into Jobs Americans wanted. From Meat Packers to Coal miners and Auto Workers…
Which brings us to our Homeless Crisis or more broadly the Housing Crisis. the problem as it was before the NLRA is one of redistribution of wealth. To start the Social Security shortfall can be traced to 10% more National income going to those earning far above the cap. Those like Bezos whose wage income can be 1 dollar but whose Capital Gains are un-taxed by payroll taxes or most any other tax and are in the hundreds of millions to the billion…
We are unable to fix this because ,as Howard Zinn said:
“In America we pay just as much to just as many as necessary to prevent real change.” Which brings us back to housing. As Diane you are probably aware, NY Gov. Hochul proposed a major Housing plan for NYC suburbs to help solve the Housing shortage . The thought of allowing 2 and 3 family houses on what was formerly 1/4 to 2 Acre Zoning ; was more than the good people of long Island could handle. As they brought out the guillotine Hochul withdrew the plan…
After all the price of entry into their Communities and School Districts was the high cost of Real Estate and high Real Estate taxes. So as the good people of Long Island bitch all the way to the bank about the high cost of housing being unaffordable for young people. As they cry about homeless vets. Working and middle class voters not just on long Island, do ll they can to keep the system from changing. Do all they can to prevent those re-distributive policies from M4All to building more housing in their communities. They have ” just enough ” and do not care that Musk Bezos and Trump are obtaining great wealth on the backs of others. In fact they voted for Trump to make sure it only gets worse.
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lol this reminds me of my $10 donation to my kid’s boarding school.
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Compared to Bezos, you were very generous!!
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Yeah, the math probably works out that way.
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