<p>Forbes releases its ranking this year. And Bill Gates toppled the rank with a new worth of 51 billion. I found it interesting on how the Walton family are one of the richest family in the world.
Here is the ranking:
<a href="http://biz.yahoo.com/special/400_05.html%5B/url%5D">http://biz.yahoo.com/special/400_05.html</a></p>
<p>With a fortune of 51 billion, Gates could pay the entire college tuition for an average state school for 1,275,000 students for four years.</p>
<p>But he is not going to. Bill Gates is a very charitable person though. Even though I guess he has no other way of spending the money...</p>
<p>do you think he'd give me some if i wrote a tear-inducing letter to him about needing the money?</p>
<p>yeah cause he never gets those</p>
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<blockquote> <p>Bill Gates is a very charitable person though<<</p> </blockquote>
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<p>Bill Gates' WIFE is a very charitable person. He never gave much of anything to charity prior to his marriage. It is Melinda Gates who is responsible for his big gift giving.</p>
<p>How do I get that gig? I would be in favor of gay marriage if Bill Gates asked me.</p>
<p>When you think about it, USSR's idea wasn't so bad in principle...</p>
<p>Except janitors made the same as rocket scientists and there was a 6 year wait for a piece of ***** car.</p>
<p>In theory, communism is probably one of the most efficient economies. In practice, it just doesn't work (as seen in the USSR and China)</p>
<p>Will it works in China, but it's not really communism though. More like a mixed economy with a controlled/locked political group.</p>
<p>But the USA is a controlled political group also since we only have two parties which are practically the same and it's just one big police state.</p>
<p>Gates has my respect, he has played a HUGE role in how the modern world functions. Whether you're a bitter Linux/Mac user, like it or not Gates has earned his money through unsurpassed innovation and shrewd business tactics. I think he represents a grand example of capitalism.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I think he represents a grand example of capitalism.
[/quote]
I certainly respect your opinion on this -- it is shared by many. But I must disagree. Microsoft is successful because it operates like China. I cannot name a single significant technology advancement that originated from Microsoft. For example, the Local Area Network started with Novell; the graphic user interface originated at XEROX PARC and was implemented by Apple six years before Microsoft. JAVA was invented by Sun Microsystems. The wave of word processing began with WANG and Wordperfect. Spreadsheets started with Lotus. The webbrowser began with Netscape. All of these major advancements in computer science were copied by Microsoft. In fact, Bill Gates did not come up with DOS, he bought it from someone else. Microsoft has killed more innovation than it has created. The one good thing that the Clinton Administration did was to initiate an anti trust suit against Microsoft. If the Federal District Court Judge had not been an idiot and talked to the press while the case was pending, Microsoft would have been broken up and we all would have been better off.</p>
<p>This guy is an alumni from my high school (public school in the suburbs of Philly). He was somewhere in the 350's or so last year, and he climbed all the way to #93.. pretty cool stuff..</p>
<p>By the way, I know this because he came to our school 2 weeks ago to be honored into our Hall of Fame. He donated a bunch of money (probably more than one million dollars) and our new football stadium is now named after him. His speech was very inspirational by the way. He talked about his humbling beginnings, how he knew he wasn't smart but just applied himself, and how he worked his way up with very little help (he moved from NE Philly to our school district right before high school). In case anyone is interested, here is a link to my school's hall of fame (he's on the very bottom of the page):
<a href="http://www.abington.k12.pa.us/senior/hall_of_fame/past_awards.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.abington.k12.pa.us/senior/hall_of_fame/past_awards.html</a></p>
<p>P.S.- He noted in his speech that when he was friends with W. Bush, he thought the only president he would be was that of the fraternity.. lol..</p>
<p>Speaking of rich people and things sounding good in theory Reganomics blew hard. Just something to think about.</p>
<p>Blackstone is godly...thats awesome he went to your school KRabble</p>
<p>I thought it was interesting how several of the top 10 (and lower) were college dropouts. </p>
<p>Any idea why? </p>
<p>EDIT: Idea, maybe they came up with their idea/inheritance (though most were self-made) in college, and pursued it instead of college.</p>
<p>What is Blackstone anyway? I'm guessing it's some type of financial company or whatnot, but what does it do exactly?</p>
<p>Yeah, I was very surprised that someone so successful came from my bland, bland school lol.. I think the CEO of Bose speakers is also an alumni from my high school, but I'm not sure. Bob Saget (comedian and Danny Tanner from Full House) is also an alumni lol..</p>
<p>KRabble88, my dad went to Abington Senior High, small world.</p>
<p>coureur, he's still giving the most money and while some part of may have been his wife's doing, he is still very generous.</p>
<p>for every dollar he earns, he donates about 40% of it away.</p>