Bill and Melinda Gates Lead Forbes List as Most Charitable Americans. Microsoft co-founder and his wife donated about $2.65 billion last year to promote education and on their efforts to combat deadly diseases around the world, among other initiatives.
One significant donation cited by Forbes was the $50 million dollars given by the couple to the International Aids Vaccine Initiative. Major donations went to the World Health Organization, the Medicines for Malaria Venture, and UNICEF.
Over their lifetime, Bill and Melinda Gates have donated $30.2 billion, which about 37% of their net worth.
The Gates channeled their philanthropic works through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and teaming up with other people or organizations to donate money and resources to address a select number of global problems and concerns.
Forbes said the Gates continue to fight malaria, polio, AIDS, and other diseases worldwide while also working to reform education in America.
Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has taken the No. 4 spot on the list of U.S. top givers.
According to Forbes, Zuckerberg donated $991 million toward education and healthcare in 2013. In total, he has donated $1.5 billion over his lifetime, representing 4% of his net worth. Zuckerberg’s charitable donations last year came in the form of Facebook stocks and were twice the amount he gave in 2012.
One donation noted by Forbes was the $991 million given to the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, which makes grants in at least 40 different countries.
The list also has Gates’ co-founder of Giving Pledge and Berjshire Hathaway chairman and CEO Warren Buffett, and other large companies’ founders and CEO such as Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, Intel co-founder Gordon Moore, Dell founder Michael Dell, former Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, and eBay founder and chairman Pierre Omidyar.
Forbes teamed up with Philanthropic Research Institute of Boca Raton, Florida, to come up with the list of Americans who gave the most to charity last year.
This archive content was originally published October 5, 2014 (www.betawired.com)