The Philanthropy Threat
7th February 2023
The predilections of the ultra-rich will likely loom over politics and policy debates for decades to come. In the U.S., nonprofits’ assets have grown nine-fold since 1980. In 2020, nonprofits brought in $2.62 trillion in revenues, constituting more than 5.6% of the U.S. economy. And this process is just beginning, as the boomers begin to leave behind their riches. The consulting firm Accenture projects that the Silent Generation and baby boomers will gift their heirs up to $30 trillion by 2030, and up to $75 trillion by 2060.
Yet this bounty will be highly limited due to the rapid concentration of assets in ever fewer hands, with the top 1% in the U.S. increasing their share by roughly 50% since 2002. The class implications of this process are profound. The winners clearly will be the small pool of big inheritors, as we already see in Jeff Bezos’ ex-wife, MacKenzie Scott; Bill Gates’ now-discarded wife, Melinda French Gates; and Laurene Powell Jobs, the left-leaning publisher of The Atlantic and the widow of Apple’s founder.