MacKenzie, ex-wife of Amazon founder, has donated more than $4bn (£3bn) to food banks

[uk666]

MacKenzie, ex-wife of Amazon founder, has donated more than $4bn (£3bn) to food banks

Mackenzie Scott has revealed that she has donated more than $4.1 billion (£3bn) to 384 food banks and charities.

The philanthropist and former partner of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has written a blog post explaining how the global pandemic allowed her to gain a new perspective on life.

Posting on Medium, the 50-year-old described the pandemic as 'a wrecking ball in the lives of Americans already struggling', and said she wanted to do something to help.

She wrote: "After my post in July, I asked a team of advisors to help me accelerate my 2020 giving through immediate support to people suffering the economic effects of the crisis.

"The result over the last four months has been $4,158,500,000 in gifts to 384 organisations across all 50 states, Puerto Rico, and Washington D.C."

"Some are filling basic needs: food banks, emergency relief funds, and support services for those most vulnerable.

"Others are addressing long-term systemic inequities that have been deepened by the crisis: debt relief, employment training, credit and financial services for under-resourced communities, education for historically marginalised and underserved people, civil rights advocacy groups, and legal defence funds that take on institutional discrimination."

Ms Scott also take a swipe at her ex and other multi-billionaires who had actually benefited from this disastrous year.

She added: "Economic losses and health outcomes alike have been worse for women, for people of colour, and for people living in poverty. Meanwhile, it has substantially increased the wealth of billionaires."

One of the companies to have benefitted from Ms Scott's latest donations, receiving $10 million (£7.4m), is Craft3, a Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) that invests in businesses run by people of colour.

In a statement, Adam Zimmerman, president and CEO of Craft3, said: "We are incredibly honoured by the recognition that comes with this unprecedented gift. Community Development Financial Institutions are the front line of inclusive, equitable finance in the United States."

This comes a few months after Scott, whose fortune of $60bn (£44bn) - as per Bloomberg's billionaire list - makes her the richest woman in the world, donated $1.68bn (£1.24bn) to 116 non-profits, community development groups, and legal organisations.

In a blog post back in July, MacKenzie wrote: "Like many, I watched the first half of 2020 with a mixture of heartbreak and horror. Life will never stop finding fresh ways to expose inequities in our systems; or waking us up to the fact that a civilisation this imbalanced is not only unjust, but also unstable.

"What fills me with hope is the thought of what will come if each of us reflects on what we can offer."

[BamSec1]

On 12/16/2020 at 12:18 PM, uk666 said:

MacKenzie, ex-wife of Amazon founder, has donated more than $4bn (£3bn) to food banks

 

[bluescope]

and Jeff Bezos is still the world's richest person (more than 186 billion dollars according to Forbes) after a divorce in which his ex-wife was awarded more than 36 billion dollars?! Meanwhile, Mackenzie's wealth has almost doubled in a very short time despite her massive and decidedly laudable charitable donations. Just think, if they hadn't divorced, Elon Musk couldn't get a shoo-in even if he rode one of his rockets into the calculations!

 

1	Jeff Bezos	$186.2 B	▶ $1.3 B | -0.69%	57	Amazon	United States
2		Bernard Arnault & family	$180.9 B	▶ $2.6 B | -1.43%	72	LVMH	France
3		Elon Musk	$142.5 B	▶ $4.2 B | -2.86%	49	Tesla, SpaceX	United States
4		Bill Gates	$125.6 B	▶ $1.3 B | -1.06%	65	Microsoft	United States
5		Mark Zuckerberg	$111.2 B	▶ $1.3 B | -1.11%	37	Facebook	United States
6		Warren Buffett	$106.9 B	▶ $1.6 B | -1.45%	90	Berkshire Hathaway	United States
7		Larry Ellison	$100.6 B	▶ $1.3 B | -1.27%	76	software	United States
8		Larry Page	$97.8 B	▶ $928 M | -0.94%	48	Google	United States
9		Sergey Brin	$94.8 B	▶ $892 M | -0.93%	47	Google	United States
10		Amancio Ortega	$88.2 B	▶ $1.7 B | -1.94%	85	Zara	Spain
11		Francoise Bettencourt Meyers & family	$84.4 B	▶ $862 M | -1.01%	67	L'Oréal	France
12		Mukesh Ambani	$77.4 B	▶ $333 M | 0.43%	64	diversified	India
13		Steve Ballmer	$71.3 B	▶ $653 M | -0.91%	65	Microsoft	United States
14		Carlos Slim Helu & family	$68.4 B	▶ $846 M | -1.22%	81	telecom	Mexico
15		Alice Walton	$67.0 B	▶ $250 M | 0.37%	71	Walmart	United States
16		Jim Walton	$65.3 B	▶ $242 M | 0.37%	72	Walmart	United States
17		Gautam Adani & family	$65.1 B	▶ $671 M | 1.04%	58	infrastructure, commodities	India
18		Rob Walton	$64.5 B	▶ $236 M | 0.37%	76	Walmart	United States
19		Zhong Shanshan	$64.0 B	▶ $57 M | -0.09%	66	beverages, pharmaceuticals	China
20		Ma Huateng	$59.3 B	$0	49	internet media	China
21		Michael Bloomberg	$59.0 B	$0	79	Bloomberg LP	United States
22		MacKenzie Scott	$56.6 B	▶ $444 M | -0.78%	51	Amazon	United States
23		François Pinault & family	$53.7 B	▶ $801 M | -1.47%	84	luxury goods	France
24		Phil Knight & family	$49.7 B	▶ $832 M | -1.65%	83	Nike	United States
25		Michael Dell	$49.2 B	▶ $856 M | -1.71%	56	Dell computers	United States