Billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott announced Wednesday that she has given away more than $3.8 billion to 465 organizations.
Scott, the ex-wife of Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, wrote in a Medium post that she made the donations over the last nine months. The list of recipients includes a range of non-profit organizations, though Scott said she’s particularly focused on supporting groups who are helping to uplift “those whose voices have been underrepresented.”
“Our team’s focus over these last nine months has included some new areas, but as always our aim has been to support the needs of underrepresented people from groups of all kinds,” Scott wrote. “The cause of equity has no sides.”
Scott has taken an unusual approach to philanthropy, often making surprise multibillion-dollar donations to charities. She has so far given away more than $12 billion in four rounds of funding.
Scott’s net worth is estimated to be more than $55 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Scott became one of the world’s wealthiest women following her divorce from Bezos in 2019, which left her with a 4% stake in Amazon. Her ex-husband is the second wealthiest person in the world, behind Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
In 2019, Scott signed the Giving Pledge, committing to give away at least half of her fortune to charity. The Giving Pledge was started by Warren Buffett and Bill and Melinda Gates in 2010 to encourage the world’s ultra-rich to distribute their wealth.
Scott is now married to Dan Jewett, a Seattle science teacher. Last March, Jewett joined Scott in signing the Giving Pledge.
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