It has been five years since MacKenzie Scott became one of the richest people on the planet after splitting from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
In 2019, the pair’s divorce made history as Scott became the fourth wealthiest woman in the world after she received a four percent stake in Amazon worth at the time around $38 billion.
Following the news that she declared that she’d sign up to the Giving Pledge, which encourages the wealthiest people on the planet to commit to giving at least half of their fortunes away to charity – with the initiative created by Bill Gates and investor Warren Buffett.
Since then, the 54-year-old is said to have given away $19.2 billion to charity – although according to Forbes’ rich list the philanthropist still has a net value of $32.3 billion, with her wealth notably having hit a height of $53 billion as her Amazon shares spiked in value.
Taking to her blog Yield Giving, Scott wrote: “I love words, and this year this one has been on my mind a lot. It’s another one that seems to have undergone a kind of semantic shrivelling.
“On the list of its big, beautiful, original definitions? To devote resources for a useful purpose. To endow with rights. To clothe.”
She went on to explain how she had uploaded information about the $2,004,400,000 she had donated to the 199 organisations in the calendar year.
Enterprise Community Partners received the most of all the organisations that disclosed how much they received.
A description read: “Our mission is to make home and community places of pride, power and belonging. We focus on the greatest need, the massive shortage of affordable rental homes, to 1) increase the supply of affordable homes, 2) advance racial equity and 3) build resilient communities and ensure upward mobility for all.”
It received $65 million, having already received $50 million in 2020 – taking the total to $115 million.
While she also donated $50 million to the Undue Medical Debt, formerly RIP Medical Debt, having donated $30 million in 2022 and $50 million in 2020 – totalling $130 million over four years.
Scott’s blog continued in part: “Roughly 75% of them are non-profits that support the economic security and opportunity of people who are struggling by improving access to affordable housing, jobs that provide stability for themselves and their families, child development and post-secondary education, healthcare, and financial counseling, business coaching, and low-interest rate loans focused on increasing economic potential and building wealth.
“The others support well-being through other means, such as work on human rights and natural resources conservation.”
Meanwhile, Scott’s ex-husband Bezos, who is worth $242.3 billion according to Forbes, has only given away around $3 billion – which is fractionally over one percent of his net worth.
However, he has vowed to commit $10 billion by 2030 to The Bezos Earth Fund, which has been created to fight climate change and protect nature.
