MacKenzie Scott, the ex-wife of Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon.com, said in a blog post that she donated $ 4.2 billion of her fortune in the past four months. Scott said she had accelerated her charitable plans due to the “devastating ball” of the pandemic, which also indicated “a significant increase in billionaires’ wealth.”

Scott is among those billionaires whose fortunes have increased a year ago pandemic The United States was paralyzed for the first time in March. Her fortune is now estimated at more than $ 60 billion, which represents a nearly $ 24 billion boost since the start of the year. Depending To the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Its wealth is largely linked to that of Amazon.com, whose stocks have jumped 67% this year as more consumers shop online due to the pandemic. Scott’s charitable contributions come in their wake Signing the bid pledge, A charity campaign founded by famous investor Warren Buffett, in May 2019, she has pledged to donate most of her fortune to charitable causes over the course of her life.

On December 15th, Scott Advertise Her recent charity favorite in a post on Medium, she wrote that she is inspired by popular efforts to help people in need, such as community fridges and Venmo’s improvised person-to-person gifts. Scott said she started by looking at 6,490 organizations, then narrowed her list down to 384 organizations with “high potential for impact.”

Many of these organizations, such as food banks, cater to basic needs, while others focus on what Scott called “long-term systemic inequalities deepened by the crisis.”

“We shared each of our gift decisions with program leaders for the first time over the phone, and we welcomed them to spend the funding on what they think would best serve their efforts,” she wrote. “The responses of the people who took the calls often included personal stories and tears.”

“Acts of Mercy”

Chuck Collins, director of the Philanthropy Reform Initiative at the Institute for Policy Studies, said Scott’s approach to charitable giving is noteworthy – and not just in terms of the size of the gifts. Collins, heir to Oscar Mayer’s food empire, himself gave away much of his fortune.

“Scott, a newcomer on the billionaire fortune scene, has surrounded herself with counselors from under-resourced communities, not the people who normally sit on founding boards,” Collins said in an emailed statement.

“As a result, the bulk of these gifts are for acts of mercy during this pandemic – food banks, direct social service organizations, emergency funds, support services for the most vulnerable,” he added.

This isn’t the first time Scott has given up a large portion of her fortune. In July, she said she did Donated $ 1.7 billion From her personal fortune to charity. These gifts were intended for organizations committed to race and gender equality, economic mobility, public health, climate change and more.