In a letter to his daughter, Max, born December 1, Zuckerberg publicized he will offer away 99 per cent of the value of his Facebook shares worth over $45 billion to charitable causes, targeted at decreasing diseases and endorsing learning and novelty. The announcement is in keeping with the Giving Pledge, a campaign started in 2011 by Warren Buffet and Bill and Melinda Gates to get the wealthiest people in the world to donate at least half of their wealth to charity. As of August 2015, 137 billionaires or former billionaires have signed the pledge. At 31, Zuckerberg is the youngest. I was one of nearly two million people who liked his post and 270,000 who shared it.
“Our hopes for your generation focus on two ideas,” he wrote, “advancing human potential and promoting equality. Advancing human potential is about pushing the boundaries on how great a human life can be... Promoting equality is about making sure everyone has access to these opportunities, regardless of the nation, families or circumstances they are born into. Our society must do this not only for justice and charity but for the greatness of human progress.”
While many people applaud the move, Zuckerberg is facing criticism from some who feel that by establishing a limited liability company, rather than a traditional non-profit, to manage his philanthropy he is avoiding scrutiny and benefiting from tax loopholes. Zuckerberg denies the criticisms. The US tax laws are mostly a mystery to me, but it seems counter-intuitive that the same person who wants to give away his money is simultaneously looking for ways to avoid paying his taxes.
Furthermore, when I look at Zuckerberg gazing down at the baby with just a twitch of a smile, it looked like right behind his eyelids were tears of joy, and hope for a better world that most new parents immediately want for their newborn. I experienced it, most profoundly, with my first daughter. I wrote her a note too, promising her caring, the love of her family, and the best life I can give her, and stuck it beside her first photos inside her album. On the opposite page, I pasted in its entirety, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of the Child, the second of which states: “The child shall enjoy special protection, and shall be given opportunities and facilities by law and other means to enable him (or her) to develop physically, mentally, morally, spiritually, and socially in a healthy and normal manner and in conditions of freedom and dignity. In the enactment of laws for this purpose, the best interest of the child shall be paramount consideration.”
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