MacKenzie Scott has done it again.
After donating $ 1.7 billion to charity last July – and announcing that she is no longer using the last name of her ex-husband, Jeff Bezos – she stated that she has spent an additional $ 4.2 billion to 384 organizations.
As all the tech brethren fight over space colonization and California tax codes, banding together for the one thing they really care about – fighting off antitrust lawmakers – Scott makes them all look like stingy, greedy incels without a shred of compassion with those ruined by COVID-19.
“This pandemic has wrecked the lives of Americans already struggling,” Scott wrote in a Medium post on December 15. “Economic losses and health outcomes have been worse for women, for people of color and for those living in poverty. Meanwhile, it has significantly increased the wealth of billionaires.”
Billionaires who, with the exception of Bill Gates and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, have been relatively mothers of this pandemic. Do you remember Elon Musk noisily plunging into the Thai cave rescue crisis, acting like a real Tony Stark? Why so quiet now?
And where is Mark Zuckerberg? He has signaled political ambitions. Do you know what helps with that? Acts of generosity, compassion and humanity.
That said, no one on the planet has benefited more from this pandemic than Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos (who not long ago publicly humiliated Scott by engaging in an extramarital affair with his now fiancé). Amazon has been the biggest beneficiary of the COVID-19 crisis so far and is likely to be for a while as the physical retail industry crumbles and even older, tech-averse Americans resort to online shopping.
In a recent USA Today report, Bezos is ranked # 1 among 30 billionaires made even more disgusting by a virus that has claimed 1.65 million lives worldwide. In April 2020, just a month later, more Americans were unemployed – 14.7 percent – than ever before, according to a congressional report.
Yet Bezos has remained eerily silent about the economic devastation so many Americans have suffered. A survey conducted by The Washington Post (also owned by Bezos) in June reported that he, “the world’s richest man with a net worth of $ 143 billion,” has given only $ 125 million to charities so far in 2020.
To be clear, that’s only 0.08 percent of his wealth – the equivalent of rummaging around in his bank for small change.
Meanwhile, in February, Bezos bought the Beverly Hills estate from David Geffen for $ 165 million. Last summer, he bought several New York apartments for $ 80 million, and in April it was reported that he had bought another new New York apartment for $ 16 million. During this pandemic, Bezos’ wealth increased by $ 13 billion in just one day in July. Amazon stock traded at $ 1,700 pre-lockdown. Now they are at over $ 3,000.
All this as employees at Amazon fulfillment centers protested and begged for proper PPE and workplace safety conditions. Some, like New York City Protestant Christian Smalls, were fired. Amazon exec Tim Bray resigned in May, calling such firings “chicken hit” and wrote in a blog post that “if Amazon remained VP, it would in fact have meant shutting down actions I despised.”
As The Guardian noted, Bezos is now worth more than Exxon Mobil, McDonald’s, or Nike.
But his ex-wife, who got $ 38 billion in the divorce, puts him in the shadow of charity.
“She’s responding urgently to the present moment,” Chuck Collins, director of the Charity Reform Initiative at the Institute for Policy Studies, told The New York Times. “You think about all these technological fortunes, they are the big disruptors, but they are disrupting the norms around billionaire philanthropy by acting quickly.”
In her Medium post, Scott wrote about average Americans who gave what they could – not only financially, but of themselves – to help others in need.
“Our hope is nurtured by others,” Scott wrote, encouraging those of us who are lucky enough to have jobs, homes, and health to give what we can. “The hope you nourish with your gift,” she concludes, “will likely nourish your own.”
With her gifts, Scott has not only proven her beautiful holiday spirit. She has proven what Scrooges’ billionaire brethren – and especially her ex-husband – really are.