

Mark Zuckerberg Just Gave $990 Million To Charity - chaz
http://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuckerberg-just-gave-990-million-to-charity-2013-12

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forgottenpass
Good on him, I say that because the rest of my post isn't about him, but
culture in general.

 _But when Mark Zuckerberg follows the lead of other tech giants, like Bill
Gates, and makes massive charitable donations, it restores your faith in the
industry 's humans._

Zuckerberg dumped some stock onto his own charity before going back to his day
job of eroding privacy and creeping on social relationships for profit. I
always assumed that if you could look at him divorced from the opinions he
holds to rationalize his business model, that Zuckerberg would be a decent
person. Most people are.

If the Business Insider writer's faith in valley tech dudes is restored by
this, he is way more jaded than I ever expected. The "Arrogance Bubble"
article the author links suggest my cynicism might even need to be turned up a
few clicks.

------
jumbled
More accurate title: "Mark Zuckerberg Just Gave 18 Million Facebook Shares to
Charities, One of Which is His Own Charity"

Is there precedence for giving stocks to charities? To me that doesn't seem
quite the same as donating to charity. More of a PR move than an act of good
will.

~~~
eigenvalue
This is absurd. The charity can immediately sell the stock if it wants to.
There are large tax advantages to the donor for donating highly appreciate
shares of stock (see
[https://www.google.com/search?q=donating+highly+appreciated+...](https://www.google.com/search?q=donating+highly+appreciated+stock)
).

If someone were planning on giving to charity anyway, it would be crazy to pay
the taxes on the appreciated shares and give what is left over after taxes to
the charity, when you could instead just give the shares (the charity would
still get the full value even if the shares were immediately sold, because
most charities are tax exempt).

