(January 22, 2013 at 5:02 pm)Tiberius Wrote: You think giving away 50% or more of your wealth is comparable with reducing a few percentage points of income tax? Get real. This whole "the rich are all miserable bastards who don't actually care about people like I do" attitude stinks.
I used to work at Wal-Mart years ago, and one thing that company loved to do (besides pay us a fraction of what we should have been making and constantly cut hours and benefits while our store posted ever larger profits) was boast loudly of its charitable donations... a significant portion of which was coaxed out of us employees.
Considering the kind of business Wal-Mart runs, it amounts to nothing but PR, and it's an astounding scam, considering that the Walton Family itself has more money than a vast percentage of all Americans and what Wal-Mart donates would barely be a drop in the bucket compared to that wealth. It tastes like used dishwater. Other big-box retailers pull exactly the same stunt.
I will be impressed with rich people donating when they are donating everything they don't need. Not a single person in the world has needs which require millions, or billions of dollars. It is, of course, one's own right to keep as much as they want, but when you're a billionaire, you can afford to donate far more than 50% of your wealth.
