Would you rather that they compete over who has the largest yacht or the most jets? Think of it as a positive form of conspicuous consumption. Just as a business can be good for both the owner and the customer, charity can be beneficial for both the givers and the recipients.

I would rather have them compete over who can pull off the most awesome technological breakthroughs (asteroid mining, cheap space flight, life extension, genetic therapy, artificial biology, vanquishing diseases).

But honestly, how many of them were going to do that with the money, anyway? I agree that charity is better than conspicuous consumption.

"positive form of conspicuous consumption"

I don't see spending money on yachts or jets as negative and somehow the fact that "charity" is mentioned that's automatically positive. People earn a living staffing yachts and jets, they are built by companies employing people. That money circulates further in the economy and provides benefits and is paying for someone's health care and college education.

So to answer your question "Would you rather that they compete..." I would rather they do whatever they want to do with the money they have earned without some kind of movement played out in the press which makes it looks like donating 1/2 to charity is the noble choice to make.

No. Just no.

Where do you think money GOES when it is donated to charity? It doesn't disappear. Are you seriously making the argument that it's better for the world that $X is used to purchase an expensive unnecessary item, than actually spending it on things that matter in the world?

"charity" is not some bullshit phrase that means "wasted money". There are a lot of people in the world who make really compelling cases for certain charity money being better spent, in terms of global well being, than almost anything else. See http://www.givewell.org and http://www.givingwhatwecan.org.

I definitely agree. Do you think there's some value in making it easier for companies to promote a "positive form of conspicuous consumption"? Or do you think the action is more of a means in itself?

For example, if AZ said "Hey users of instagram (or users of AZ product that just sold), we're going to let you decide which cause some of this money goes to," would that create a delta in value from the original proposition?

Did you miss the last two centuries where philanthropists built universities named after themselves (or their family members)?

"Surplus wealth is a sacred trust which its possessor is bound to administer in his lifetime for the good of the community." - Andrew Carnegie

Interestingly, many of our investors (LPs), and many LPs of our fellow venture firms, are nonprofit institutions such as universities and foundations that were originally started by people with names like Carnegie, Rockefeller, Ford, Stanford (a "robber baron" of his age), Yale (a governor of the British East India Company of all things), Hewlett, Packard, and the like. Money earned through capitalism that got plowed into nonprofits that invest in modern venture capital -- it's a wonderful cycle.

I have no idea how your comment relates to what I've said.

I said "Seems that over the last several years or so there has been an uptick in wealthy people using peer pressure to get other wealthy people to give away their money"

Did you miss this?

http://givingpledge.org/#enter

Is there peer pressure? Sure, but at the end of the day, everyone of them made a personal decision to make that pledge. Could they have redistributed their resources to more businesses? Ok, but they chose the charitable route. Are there people that need these resources more than businesses? Absolutely: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Development_Goals#Go...

Sadly, we do not live in a perfect world. The resources and opportunities we take for granted are the same ones others do not have. Giving others a chance at the life and opportunities that were given to us is probably the wisest investment of all. The returns are deeper than dollars.