New York, NY – Hedge fund manager George Soros and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg top a new list of the nation’s 50 most generous donors during 2010, with Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, the youngest donor ever to make the list, tied for 10th. The ranking, published today by the Chronicle of Philanthropy, contains only 17 of America’s 400 richest people, even though more than 50 billionaires (including Bloomberg and Zuckerberg) have signed the Giving Pledge promising to eventually donate more than half their net worth to charity.
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According to the Chronicle, billionaire Soros, 80, gave $332 million in 2010 to his Open Society Foundations, which funds liberal and human rights causes around the world. Bloomberg, 68, spread $279.2 million among nearly 1,000 charities, primarily in New York. The third largest donor, banker and subprime pioneer T. Denny Sanford, 75, fell off the 400 richest list in 2010, after the stock market crash. Nevertheless, the Chronicle reports Sanford donated $162.5 million in 2010, including a $100 million gift to his Sanford Health Foundation in Sioux Falls, S.D, to research and treat breast cancer. He too has signed the Giving Pledge.
The Chronicle noted that while nearly half of the gifts of $5 million or more made by those on its list went to colleges and universities, younger donors such as Zuckerberg and eBay founder Pierre Omidyar are setting a different pattern—giving to social entrepreneurship, human rights, public schools and other causes.
…. and not one dollar to yeshivos, kollelim and Jewish schools or organizations of all types that are there for everyone in their our of need. Just goes to show that one has to be zoicha (merit) to give tzedakah, and its clear these individuals do not merit this great mitzvah. So Bloomberg keep giving the art centers and animal shelters and the New York Philhamonics, and all these other places…. if only you knew what it meant (and what it could do for YOU) to support Torah, but I’m afraid you’ll know when it’ll be too late.What a huge rachmonus.