Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is accelerating his pledge to donate most of what remains of his fortune to charity.
Gates, who was once the world's richest man, announced Thursday that he will give around $200 billion over the next 20 years to his charity, the Gates Foundation. He also announced the foundation would close by 2045.
"People will say a lot of things about me when I die, but I am determined that 'he died rich' will not be one of them," Gates wrote in a blog post announcing the plans.
This is a much faster timeline than he and his ex-wife, Melinda French Gates', original plan for the foundation.
Gates spoke with All Things Considered host Ari Shapiro on why his philanthropic efforts have taken on a new sense of urgency in this current political moment.
Disclosure: The Gates Foundation is a financial supporter of NPR.
This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity
Interview highlights
Ari Shapiro: When you started the foundation, the intention was to sunset it several decades after your death. So what made you change your mind and set this much tighter deadline?
Bill Gates: Well, I've learned a lot in the last 25 years, including the incredible impact that these resources can have. I know there'll be lots of rich people in the future and the needs are very urgent today. I want to spend it on an even higher level than we are right now because I see the pipeline of innovations. Some are pretty straightforward, like vitamins for pregnant women or things that are complicated, like AI health delivery or gene editing to cure HIV. So with that in mind, I'd like to make sure we do as much as we can in these 20 years. And I've built a strong organization, hopefully I'll be able to help guide it during all of those 20 years, but if not, it's got a strong culture and I'm sure it'll it'll do well.
Shapiro: The amount of money we're talking about can be hard to imagine. So, can you give us an example of what specifically you'll be able to do in the next couple decades with $200 billion plus that you would not have been able to do with the mere tens of billions of dollars that you had been planning to spend over that next 20 years?
Gates: One of the areas we work in is agriculture. Health is by far the biggest, about 70%, and then education is about 15%. But agriculture, some people are surprised, that we can do incredible things to improve seeds and educate farmers. So that even in Africa, where today the productivity is the lowest and they face climate change and population growth, we want to get kids even more nutrition despite all of that.
So we do better seeds, better chickens, better cows. And that's an area we're growing our spending a lot. This idea of curing HIV, curing sickle cell, a few kids have been cured of sickle cell, but it costs millions of dollars for each case. We want to do that for less than $100. So it's very advanced science and it'll take us even spending full speed, maybe 8 to 10 years to get that done. But I'm able to say to those scientists who are incredible, "Please go full speed ahead."
Shapiro: You've mentioned some ambitious goals like curing HIV, but less ambitious goals like treating HIV have seen dramatic cuts since the Trump administration has ended many of its foreign aid programs, like USAID.
Does your announcement have anything to do with the government pulling back on foreign aid spending? Are you trying to fill that gap?
Gates: No. My decision came after thinking about this for several years and was really timed with the year I turned 70 and our 25th anniversary.
And so it's kind of strange that here we are in the middle of a global health emergency, where the U.S. made gigantic, abrupt cuts. And some of the European countries are also making cuts because of the demands to raise their defense spending. And so, you know, I can't overstate how awful it is to be in a period where the number of children who die is going to go back up; it went down from 10 million to 5 million.
Shapiro: Since the year 2000, right?
Gates: Since the year 2000, exactly. And it was supposed to keep going down. But with these cuts, millions will die.
Shapiro: You recently told The New York Times, "The world's richest man has been involved in the deaths of the world's poorest children."
That's a reference to Elon Musk leading the effort to defund USAID. Have you spoken with him about that?
Gates: No. And although he's a genius and an expert on a lot of things, I've been out, met these people. I've been to Nigeria and seen their great work. I've been to the Democratic Republic of Congo. And so this is one where I think he made a mistake.
Shapiro: What responsibility do you believe comes with enormous wealth?
Gates: It's trying to avoid killing children, maybe. I've been involved in what's called the Giving Pledge that Warren Buffett and Melinda [Gates] and I created to get philanthropists to share their thoughts and to encourage better giving, more giving. Philanthropy is on the increase, not just in the United States.
I'm trying to set an example by giving 98% of the money I have. Warren Buffett has been an inspiration to me. He talked about philanthropy even before I'd met him. He'd written an article about how giving too much money to your children isn't necessarily good for them or our society as well.
Shapiro: You're a notorious optimist. And sometimes when people who listen to the news every day ask me about the state of the world, I say, "Well, there's, you know, the Bill Gates view, which is that more people have access to clean water and education and fewer children are dying and etc., etc., etc.."
You've, in this very conversation, said "millions more children are going to die in the coming years than otherwise would have." And so, how do the cuts of the last few months shape your outlook on the state of the world?
Gates: Yeah. I think the tragedy that this is so far away means that people don't feel it. And I think the basic religious principle of treating other people well still applies. So you're going to see me speaking out a lot about these budget things. But no, I'm not pessimistic because I think the case is so strong that we can get the money back and then take advantage of pipeline and innovation, including a lot driven by advances in AI.
This story was adapted for the web by Manuela Lopez Restrepo and edited by Karen Zamora.
Disclosure: The Gates Foundation is a financial supporter of NPR.
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