Salon.com > Patriotic Billionaire Challenge

More billionaires pledge fortunes to charity

Wed, 19 Sep 2012 16:08:00 +0000

In 2010, investment leviathan Warren Buffett joined computer mogul Bill Gates and his wife, Melinda, in launching the Giving Pledge to convince similarly rich people to give 50 percent or more of their fortunes to charity. On Tuesday 11 new multimillionaires and billionaires joined the initiative. New pledges, including Netflix CEO Reed Hastings and the guy behind those little five-hour energy drinks, join illustrious philanthropists like Mark Zuckerburg, Ted Turner and Michael Bloomberg in agreeing that they can probably do without at least half of their fortunes.

Check out our slide show introducing some the Buffett-Gates pledges.

[slide_show id=13016062]

The Great 8: Billionaires who will pay more

Mon, 10 Oct 2011 11:45:00 +0000

This article made possible by Salon Core members.

When Warren Buffett called on the U.S. government in August to "stop coddling the super-rich," he pointed out that he pays less of of his income in taxes than his secretary does. He said the rich should pay higher taxes for the sake of "shared sacrifice," and suggested that most of his wealthy friends "wouldn't mind being told to pay more."

To test that notion, Salon launched the Patriotic Billionaire Challenge. We put the question to every member of the "Forbes 400" list, all of them with a net worth of at least $1 billion: "Are you, like Warren Buffett, willing to pay higher taxes?"

The results are in. Of 400 billionaires, only eight (including Buffett) say they are willing to pay more. Three others indicated opposition; one said maybe.

Financier flirts with patriotism

Wed, 14 Sep 2011 22:15:00 +0000

This article is part of the Patriotic Billionaire Challenge, an ongoing project that tracks whether America's billionaires would be willing to accept higher taxes in order to reduce the federal deficit.

Steve Schwarzman, chairman and CEO the Blackstone Group, a private-equity behemoth, made waves this week with a Financial Times Op-Ed that, on the surface, drew parallels to Warren Buffett's August tax-hike manifesto, "Stop Coddling the Super-Rich." We decided to take a closer look at the Schwarzman piece to see if we could glean his position on the Challenge.

Though the essay is titled "An Olive Branch to Obama: I Will Share the Pain," Schwarzman actually skirts the issue of his own tax burden. He does argue for "shared sacrifice," but also says eliminating the deficit cannot be achieved by "just raising taxes on the wealthiest two per cent." (It's worth noting that these two points, taken together, bear some resemblance to the cries of critics who believe the bottom 50 percent of income earners don't pay their fair share of taxes.) And, as far as prescribing actual policy, the only solution the Blackstone CEO suggests is a flat rate -- which happens to have the flavor of a regressive tax plan.

Mark Cuban accepts our Challenge

Sat, 20 Aug 2011 16:20:00 +0000

The Patriotic Billionaire Challenge has a new entrant.

Salon contacted the 20 richest people in America earlier this week, our lone question, inspired by Warren Buffett, being whether or not they would accept tax hikes in order to help reduce the deficit. From that original crop of uber-wealthy, only two have responded with definitive yes-or-no answers, while a half-dozen others declined to comment. That in mind, we decided to branch out and learn what some other outspoken billionaires might think of Buffett's proposal.

Enter, Mark Cuban.

The entrepreneur is a latter-day media magnate, with holdings including 2929 Entertainment (which owns Landmark Theatres, Magnolia Pictures and HDNet). He also moonlights as owner of the Dallas Mavericks, reigning NBA champs. Overall, Mr. Cuban is worth an estimated $2.5 billion, according to Forbes.

Our Patriotic Billionaire Challenge!

Wed, 17 Aug 2011 19:12:00 +0000

America's second-richest person -- billionaire investment oracle Warren Buffett -- caused a commotion on Monday when he argued that the "mega-rich" should pay higher taxes, pooh-poohing the argument that it would drive business out of the country. Buffett himself only surrendered 17.4 percent of his taxable income to the government last year -- a figure that lies toward the low end of the middle-class tax spectrum, and significantly below what upper-middle-class professionals pay. Buffett wrote:

"I know well many of the mega-rich and, by and large, they are very decent people. [...] Most wouldn't mind being told to pay more in taxes as well, particularly when so many of their fellow citizens are truly suffering."

Salon decided to put that idea to the test. We've contacted the other 19 wealthiest Americans -- based on the Forbes 400 list -- to ask if they would support paying higher federal income taxes. We quickly heard back from six, though only financier, philanthropist and Fox News target George Soros would say that, yes, he'd pay more (see his full statement below). We'll update this post (and alert readers through Twitter and Facebook) when we have new responses. And we hope others who have the opportunity will ask them, as well.