Steve Jobs' 'Curious' Lack of Public Philanthropy

sfsuphysics said:
I'm not a fan of Jobs, but seriously fuck that person who wrote that story. While I absolutely admire and praise what Buffett and Gates does, I'm not going to scorn a billionaire that keeps all his money. Hell he could go all Scrooge McDuck build a huge vault and swim in it for all I care.

Would it be cool if he just started donating millions to everything, sure. Is he a dick if he isn't ? no.
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Actually not being a philanthropist with billions at your disposal is almost the definition of being a dick. But last I checked there were no laws against being a dick and he can be as big a prick as he cares to be and it's no one's business but his own. I think his own actions from history have proven he is a massive asshat. But then so are a great many millionaires and billionaires. I notice that Bill Gates didn't start his foundation until he realized that history might remember him as a massive twat unless he did something worthwhile with his money.
 
Off with his head, the bastard. The nerve of that man is unbeleivable. I mean what sort of person doesn't give away his own money!? This is utter insanity and I demand a trial where he is guilty before said trial even starts and the sentence of death by burial in gasoline-drenched nuclear weapons set on fire in the center of the earth has been carried out prior. The actual trial will be more of a celebration that such a greedy bastard has been done away with!
 
I don't have a problem with it. If I had that kind of money, I'd never give anyone a cent either. It's a lifestyle choice, and I respect his decision.

ferrisnox said:
Have to agree, he didn't have any problem spending his money to buy his way onto a donor list.

This whole country is rotten. I payed more U.S. federal income tax this past year than Apple did. Look it up. Granted Apple payed a bunch of black money to lobbyists to keep their income off the books and overseas, but that's totally legal in a country where we have decide who's retirement to cut and who's healthcare to cut so corporations can continue raping American taxpayers via loopholes and write-offs.
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Retirement being part of what the government does is the problem here. Not corporate tax rates.
 
worry not, he'll be dead soon enough, and that money will probably go somewhere. maybe to his lover that was holding him up....
 
He could just be privately donating money to organizations. And he could also be holding on to his money to help fight medical costs if he has any. And even then, he could have some plan that goes into effect once he dies or something so that his money lives on to help others. I don't know, just throwing stuff out there.
Either way, I *hope* he is giving money away to good causes, even if it is private. The best part about being wealthy is being able to help others.
 
I say no. Honestly, Im of the opinion that its none of your business what Im doing with my money so long as Im not breaking the law.

If Jobs wants to hold on to his billions, thats totally fine with me. He earned it, I didnt. I dont think I have a right to bitch about him because he wont give HALF his wealth away.
 
ferrisnox said:
Have to agree, he didn't have any problem spending his money to buy his way onto a donor list.
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Lets put this idiocy to bed, shall we? At least until the next hourly 'news' about whatever Apple did or what Jobs had for lunch.

http://www.minnpost.com/healthblog/2009/06/22/9682/did_steve_jobs_jump_the_liver_transplant_queue

But, as the Chronicle article makes clear, anybody can opt to get on another state’s wait list:

“Transplantation is a very public, transparent process,” said UNOS spokesman Joel Newman. “It certainly wouldn’t be unheard of for people to look at the potential waiting times, look at their center options and make a decision based on that.”
Indeed, it’s not just celebrities who travel to another state in hopes of upping their odds of receiving a new liver. I did a quick Internet search and found a news report of a Massachusetts couple who moved to Florida in 2008 to improve their daughter’s chances of getting the life-saving surgery.
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Cliffs: It's not out of the ordinary to travel to another state to get an organ transplant.

Newman told the Chronicle that the median wait throughout the country is 20 days for the most acutely ill patients and 100 days for patients at the next highest level of illness. Those are median waits, so half the people in those categories get into the operating room faster than that. News reports had Jobs seeking a liver transplant at least as early as January. His surgery was in April — well past the 100-day mark.
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Jobs waited longer than the median wait time? :eek:

Some of you may remember that a similar media storm raged around baseball great Mickey Mantle’s liver transplant in 1995. Charges were made in the press that Mantle had been taken off the transplant list ahead of five other patients because of his celebrity status. UNOS conducted an independent review and determined that Mantle’s organ transplant was done "properly and according to established policy." Not everybody was satisfied with that finding, but the publicity surrounding Mantle’s transplant had an immediate positive effect: Requests for organ donor cards skyrocketed.
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Not everybody was satisfied--sometimes even a long form birth certificate isn't enough to satisfy everybody. :rolleyes:
 
one minor point. Stock != money. People fail to notice that. A major investor liquidating his stock would devalue their stock by a large amount.
 
Steve said:
:mad: I have a BAN emoticon...let's try it out shall we?
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While i didnt like this particular post as i stated. I Curtainly didnt mean to upset you. As you have posted 1,000's i do. I apologize for not being more tactful.
 
Even if he did buy his way onto a donors list - anybody here really want to say with a straight face that if you were facing death, you wouldnt try to buy your way onto a donors list??

God I cant believe Ive defended Jobs in 2 straight posts now. I fell so dirty.
 
Jobs is a cheap bastard. If he gives me a few mil then I'll change my opinion of him.
 
maybe its none of our damn business?

It is possible that he gave tons of money away and didn't claim it.
 
I can't stand him as a person, but I have to agree with him on this one.

His money, he should do whatever he wants with it.

If he decides to take it all into his grave, good for him.

If he decides to donate it all, good for him.

It's none of public's business as to what he does with his wealth.

Bill gates and warren buffet sicken me...
 
If I was that rich I wouldn't give a dime to charity either (or I'd do what my tax attorney told me).

As soon as he dies the US government is going to take 55% of what he has including 55% of every dollar he already paid income tax on.....THAT is directly thanks to Obama.
 
shawnoen said:
If I was that rich I wouldn't give a dime to charity either (or I'd do what my tax attorney told me).

As soon as he dies the US government is going to take 55% of what he has including 55% of every dollar he already paid income tax on.....THAT is directly thanks to Obama.
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Proof that that is the current policy please? You won't find it, because it isn't. I think you are also confused as to what branch of government makes the laws - including tax rates. Hint, it's not Obama.
 
Company Philanthropy is a dick move and it doesn't change my chance of buying one product over another at all. Sure, it's nice that places that need money get it, but it's not gonna win me over.

Let's say Corsair and Kingston both have a 4GB DDR3 stick of ram. Same cooling abilities, XMP profiles, same latency, same speed, both look kick ass, cost the SAME amount, both are just as reliable, and have the same warranty. But Corsair doesn't do Philanthropy while Kingston does. Which one do I pick? It doesn't matter! WOO. I don't care. Ram is ram. Company can burn x-amount of their money on PR like this and I'll honestly pick whatever brand I'm more biased to.
 
lilbabycat said:
Except when he pays to bump himself to the top of the Organ Donor list in multiple states and some 5 year old kid that could have had a whole life ahead of him dies.

just saying.
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That you would do a better job of determining who gets the next liver transplant than UNOS? People like you that accuse him of buying his way onto organ donor lists have no idea how the process is managed. You just automatically assume it's rigged for the rich and famous without any notion of just how transparent the process is and how much scrutiny it comes under every time anyone even vaguely famous gets a donated organ.

lilbabycat said:

You'd think a guy dying of cancer would throw some bucks to cancer research.
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I think, no matter how much you hate Steve Jobs, you can agree that Steve Jobs is one of the smartest people in the world. The proof is in the bank account. You don't get that kind of money by being stupid.

So what makes you think he's so stupid that he wouldn't fund cancer research in a big way to try to save his own life? He's just being quiet about it, and who is better at keeping quiet and private than Steve Jobs?
 
All the money in the world doesn't help you one bit when your number comes up. Most people on the brink of death get a sense of humility in their final days, others never had any to begin with.
 
When a starving child in a third-world country is fed, that child doesn't care if the money came from some dick trying to look good in a PR stunt or some philanthropist trying to do the right thing.

If you have a massive excess of money and your aren't helping those who are starving or dying from some third-world disease, then you are a dick.

You don't have to help those who can help themselves but there are a lot of people (hint: children) who are sick, starving, and dying due to the decisions made by others and who cannot help themselves.

(There are homeless, hungry, and sick children in this country, too...)

I hope Jobs is helping these kids. Maybe he is. Maybe he isn't. It IS his money but he and his heirs don't need all of it.

My $0.02
 
Nope, his money and his choice. Plus as others have said not everyone wants to go public with what they give.
 
people with that much wealth should be donating. i am not religious but greed is one of the biggest problems with the world. everything gets thrown aside for profits/power.


i cant help but lol at the people that think wealth = smart. we dont live in free market. the government is far more concerned with business profits then the people. apple tries to patten virtually everything they can think of. they have sense of entitlement that should be the only ones that gets to use buttons.


so when the government bends over backwards for companies like apple to screw people out of every last cent they can. at least the filthily rich guy could do is return some of that money.
 
Whether or not he donates, he's still the leader of a cult.

And we all know where the money goes with cults...
 
I really don't give a damn if Jobs donates or not, it's not like apple fanboys would follow the lead on this one methinks.

Now, who the fuck is Bono?
 
Would giving to charity be "the right thing to do" ? Who's to say - ones money is their own. No one has the right to decide what should be done with an individuals money beside the individual that it belongs to. What about filthy rich people like Steve Jobs? I think the same thing applies. Would it be noble or respectful for Jobs to dress up as Santa and pay to create then commandeer a sled that's capable of delivering wads of cash to every needy family or 'good' cause in the world all in one night? Sure. I think it would be a kind thing for him to do. I'd often think to myself, "What a swell dude...hope he was able to cut enough corners with the R&D on that sled so he can at least afford one'uh them fancy newfangled cancer cures."

Oh but wait, he's not (publicly, at least) giving his money away like that. That's fine with me, too. I don't see any problem with a person holding onto something they've worked tirelessly and made many sacrifices for. Besides, look at it this way: his family will be taken care of, probably for many generations to come. Without him, they may very well have been much worse off - poor, in bad health, lacking education, etc. He has a life, ya know - people to take care of and all that. Some of you seem to think that Jobs is this dark, scaly, possibly demon-possessed creature who stays locked away all alone in a mansion, doing nothing but sitting in various, enormous piles of cash all day long for the sheer obsessive thrill he gets out of having money come into contact with his ass cheeks.

Just because someone has more of something than you - even if you need it more than they do - doesn't mean they're in the wrong for not giving it to you.
 
tlkimball said:
When a starving child in a third-world country is fed, that child doesn't care if the money came from some dick trying to look good in a PR stunt or some philanthropist trying to do the right thing.

If you have a massive excess of money and your aren't helping those who are starving or dying from some third-world disease, then you are a dick.

You don't have to help those who can help themselves but there are a lot of people (hint: children) who are sick, starving, and dying due to the decisions made by others and who cannot help themselves.
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Third world countries don't need more food, they need more family planning centers and condoms. Look at a global map of fertility rate, and see how fertility rate and extreme poverty are linked, and ask your grandma if she's ever participated in food drives for Africa and the like. Bandaid vs solution.

There is also a big difference between a company donating money, and the CEO donating his own money, and I don't buy for a second that Steve Jobs donated a penny without letting the world know how magical his contribution was.

Considering how stingy he was to his ex and kid despite his unimaginable wealth, he doesn't seem to be a very charitable person. Its ridiculous for charity to be expected, but then again, it is also ridiculous for these CEOs to make the salary of a thousand brain-surgeons. They aren't that intelligent nor valuable to society, and their contribution is completely divorced from their compensation.
 
These guys donated on their own so every time someone doesn't "publicly" donate (as much as these two in particular *or any number of un-named*) now we're going to chastise the rest??? What about this... What about how many jobs "THE JOB" created or how many families he has kept and is KEEPING fed with his own money, power and/or position???? Jumpin Jesus on a Pogo Stick... God love you lib... errrr All.. And God love you [H] for delivering yet another "unbiased" post... You're all well on your way to "major media outlet" with that type of reporting... Kudos. ;)
 
as much as i hate Jobs, i've to say, whey should he be critisized for it, if he doesn't want to than he doesn't have to donate. Donation depends on weather you want to do it or not, not because someone said you've to.
 
gesicht said:
people with that much wealth should be donating. i am not religious but greed is one of the biggest problems with the world. everything gets thrown aside for profits/power.


i cant help but lol at the people that think wealth = smart. we dont live in free market. the government is far more concerned with business profits then the people. apple tries to patten virtually everything they can think of. they have sense of entitlement that should be the only ones that gets to use buttons.


so when the government bends over backwards for companies like apple to screw people out of every last cent they can. at least the filthily rich guy could do is return some of that money.
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Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Pride... and Envy.
 
Ducman69 said:
but then again, it is also ridiculous for these CEOs to make the salary of a thousand brain-surgeons. They aren't that intelligent nor valuable to society, and their contribution is completely divorced from their compensation.
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Steve Jobs' salary was $1 per year.
 
stiltner said:
The fact that anyone feels that they are obligated to the money of another man who worked for it (and as much as I scorn Apple for its practices, Steve Jobs is fucking brilliant, there's no argument necessary there).

The fact that someone else feels they are entitled to your hard work when they don't output as much as you do pisses me off to the point where blood shoots from my eyes. People who feel that "the rich man" is the source of the problem, are actually, guess what...the problem themselves.

Fuck Apple and Steve Jobs, but its his money, he deserves to keep every red cent if he wants. Period. If you don't like it...go create something that gives you money, and then when someone bitches they want your money, see how the shoe fits on your foot.
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Well said. Who are we to judge and screw those who do:mad:
 
For a guy who got the BIGGEST EGO, disowned his kid and wife and an ass to his cutomers. Why would anyone be surprise? The guy closet probably own just 3 pair of the same jeans and black sweaters that he always wore.
 
I don't really care if it's "his" money - people are literally starving to death at this moment.
 
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