Study Shows the Super-Rich Are Not the Most Generous

Working-age Americans who make $50,000 to $100,000 a year are two to six times more generous in the share of their investment assets that they give to charity than those Americans who make more than $10 million, a pioneering study of federal tax data shows.

The least generous of all working-age Americans in 2003, the latest year for which Internal Revenue Service data is available, were among the young and prosperous - the 285 taxpayers age 35 and under who made more than $10 million - and the 18,600 taxpayers making $500,000 to $1 million. The top group had on average $101 million of investment assets while the other group had on average $2.4 million of investment assets.

On average these two groups made charitable gifts equal to 0.4 percent of their assets, while people the same age who made $50,000 to $100,000 gave gifts equal to more than 2.5 percent of their investment assets, six times that of their far wealthier peers.

.......

The I.R.S. data was analyzed by the NewTithing Group, a San Francisco-based philanthropic research organization that since 1998 has been encouraging the most prosperous Americans to give more. The full report was posted last night at www.newtithing.org.



http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/19/national/19give.html

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Let Populism Reign Again!

...than Mississippi the poorest state per capita. It is a given. The rich are selfish and about the only thing that they "trickle down" is when they donate to the poor the wad of gum on their Gucci shoes ~ and they make sure that is tax deductible.

Cat In Seattle

He did not give any real $$$$ to charity until he got married.

Bill Gates foundation to "fight Aids" is really a fight against loose Intellectual Property restrictions in the developing world. The same laws that protect AZT (which was developed almost ENTIRELY on taxpayer money) protect the outrageously overpriced Windows and Office from royalty free replication.

Bill Gates' "charity" is really just a way to protect his own bottom line.

What about Frists's AIDS "charity"? Is it also mostly an underhanded means of supporting drug patents in the 3d World?

and told him to spend some $$$..

Bill, his dad and his late mother were all known locally as philanthropists before Bill was making the big time bucks. Mary Gates I believe was influential in those contributions to the community.

The founding of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation was just a way to keep it all organized.

As for MSFT, they are big time donors around the country.

... while those who are considered "comfortable" (or even those who are struggling) realize that we're all in this together and to help others helps all of us?

I'm not saying all extremely wealthy, but we'll let this study speak for itself.

Rich people are some of the cheapest fuckers you'll ever meet.

"Cheap fuckers" is putting it mildly.

I have a relative who is worth about $15 million last time anybody checked. He buys everything on sale, no new cars, and clips coupons. No one likes to go out to dinner with him because he always sticks you with the bill.

Hubby made the mistake of going out to dinner at a country club, with another multi-millionaire. At the end of the meal, of course, they both announced they hadn't a dime in their pocket. So Hubby, who could be bought and sold many times over by these guys, had to pay the bill.

Expensive lesson for poor Hubby.

stop the Florida Minimum Wage. They lost and now have to pay their servers $1.00 more per hour. Cheap fuckers...

if I was hubby I would have requested separate checks

Hey, what can I do -- his big heart is one of his better qualities.

that's allowing oneself to be treated like a schmuck

- and I feel sure than you are not -- I will let that go. Few people are, in fact. So, if you want to call him a schmuck, go right ahead. The hundreds, nay, thousands of people he's helped in his lifetime beg to differ.

but I do NOT allow people to USE me

I apologize for that. I'm a bit protective of my husband, if only because I so deeply respect his willingness to help others.

I think this incident also involved a desire to keep peace in the family. The asshole mentioned in the original post is married to one of my husband's favorite sisters, who happens to be a great lady. He is also the father of some of his favorite nieces, who are also great people. For that alone, Hubby is willing to give him a break. And while the nieces may grumble amongst themselves about Father's cheapness, there is sort of the closing-of-the-ranks when Dad is criticized, whatever the reason -- happens in lots of families I guess.

Strangely enough, the asshole likes me. Have no idea why; I have little use for him. I keep joking to the Hubby that he'll put me in the will. He says, "Dream on ..."

Old boss of mine, worth about $15 million, had a nice $2 million house with a central stereo system. The stereo was Radio Shack. The only food in the house was ramen noodles, and the only booze was a handle of Jim Beam under the sink (probably his wife's secret stash).

A lot of them aren't spending it on themselves, either. Remember the stories about John D. Rockefeller?

in charitable giving.

Many figures I see about people giving to charity includes the amount of money they give to their church and to private schools. Much of this goes to building programs and operational expenses for their own privileged group's benefit.

Is that really "charitable giving"?

tax-exempt social clubs. The money put in the envelopes just goes to pay off the huge mortgage and expensesfor the extravagant buildings and to the overpaid pastor. Not much goes to helping the poor, etc.

Tax the fokkers.

The "old money" types at least have a tradition of charitable giving, if only for tax purposes and window dressing, but a lot of the people who became too rich too fast have this idea of, "If I can do it, anyone can do it."

My dad liked to quote this passage from Shakespeare's Julius Caesar: (My parents grew up in an age when schoolchildren were required to memorize what now seem like huge amounts of poetry.)

"But 'tis a common proof,
That lowliness is young ambition's ladder,
Whereto the climber-upward turns his face;
But when he once attains the upmost round.
He then unto the ladder turns his back,
Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees
By which he did ascend."

In other words, a lot of people who have come from a humble background and made it big are ashamed of their backgrounds, put on airs of sophistication, and make disparaging remarks about those who haven't "made it."

There was a case in Oregon a couple of years back in which a man who had made a fortune in establishing a national chain (you've heard of it) wanted an exemption from the state's land use laws to build his monster mansion too close to a riverbank. He was quoted in a newspaper article as saying, "But I have more money than I know what to do with."

Well, the letters to the editor in the following days were full of suggestions of worthy causes that could use his surplus funds.

The public reaction must have gotten to him at least a little, because I began seeing his company's name as a sponsor of the Portland International Film Festival.

Common sense says that the superrich are the most selfish tightwads in the world. They look for power; money is only the means.

they are greedy grasping pigs who go to bed with sh*t covered snouts each night and wake up to gorge on the blood of others each day.