Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Paul Allen
Paul Allen was one of the founders of Microsoft along with Bill Gates. You may have heard of Microsoft, as the company that they started gained some small measure of success. Paul Allen shared in this success, at the time of writing his personal fortune amounts to a tidy $13 billion. This makes him the worlds 37th richest person,according to Forbes.
Fortune, however, seemed to have stopped shining on Allen when he was diagnosed with a potentially deadly form of cancer. Having made a partial recovery from what is believed to have been non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, Paul Allen made a momentous decision. That decision was to give away almost all of his money to good causes.
A lot of well off people make some kind of charity donation for tax reasons, but what Paul Allen is doing goes far beyond that. He is following in the footsteps of the man he founded Microsoft with, Bill Gates. Gates has been donating heavily to charity for a long time, and last year launched a campaign to pursued billionaires to follow his example by donating at least half of their wealth to charity.
Some of Paul Allen’s money is going to various charities and charitable foundations now, but it has now been revealed that the rest be following in the form of a legacy upon his death. He as apparently made this announcement after being encouraged to do so by Bill Gates in the hope that it will provide a good example to the rest of the world’s billionaires.
Legacy giving is a growing trend, even among those who are not in the category of the super rich. Changes in the inheritance tax system mean that there could be a financial benefit to leaving a gift to a charity in your will. There can also be some other benefits, Oxfam for instance have teamed up with firm of solicitors to offer a discount on the legal fees for drawing up a will for those making a charity donation in their will.
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[...] can only afford to give so much, but philanthropists such as Bill Gates and Warren Buffett the Microsoft founders who have given away vast portions of their fortunes can make a real [...]