Thoughts on Bill Gates and His Money

I am an Apple guy, but even I can recognize Bill Gates’ real contribution to society. He, along with others, took a technology only affordable to the richest of companies and helped make it accessible to ordinary individuals. The world’s obsession with the wealth Bill Gates has accumulated from this is even more interesting than his actual story. Not that his story is boring. (In fact, if you have Netflix, check out Triumph of the Nerds, a dated, but fascinating three part 1996 PBS series that chronicles the start of the personal computer business.) But more importantly, how we view his wealth says as much about ourselves as it does him.

First, there is the question of whether he deserves it. The genius of Bill Gates is that he started a multi-multi-billion dollar company based off a software he didn’t even create. He purchased it for around $75,000. What made Bill Gates was his vision, taking the creation of others and repackaging and re-purposing it to fill a need, albeit a far greater need than even he envisioned. Ideas are what create wealth, but even ideas are only ideas until they are actually implemented. The man who created that software had no idea how big his creation could possibly be. Fortunately, Bill Gates did. Therefore, his wealth is proportional to the things he created, the foundation of an entire industry.

The second thing I find interesting about his wealth is how everyone seems to have an opinion about it. When average Americans look at someone who is better off than themselves they seem quick to talk about economic “fairness”. But the fact that Bill Gates has more money than any one man could ever possibly need does not give anyone the right to think they should have access to it or any kind of authority in redistributing it.

I am reminded of a conversation I once had with my Chinese friend Vincent, who questioned American “greed”. When the average Chinese gets by fine with an annual income of around $3,000, why would any American need to make more than $30,000 a year? After all, he mused, any more than that just means you are filthy stinking rich. It is all a matter of perspective, I guess. Either way, Vincent or anyone else has no more right to my “excess income” any more than I or anyone else has to Bill Gates’.

We spend too much time worrying about what other people have. In fact, it makes us miss the forest for the trees. As Economist Donald J. Boudreaux has aptly pointed out, if a time traveler from the 1700’s were to visit the Gates’ household today, he would marvel at the same things you and I share in common with Gates:

...a good guess is that the features of Gates's life that would make the deepest impression are that he and his family never worry about starving to death; that they bathe daily; that they have several changes of clean clothes; that they have clean and healthy teeth; that diseases such as smallpox, polio, diphtheria, tuberculosis, tetanus, and pertussis present no substantial risks; that Melinda Gates’s chances of dying during childbirth are about one-sixtieth what they would have been in 1700; that each child born to the Gateses is about 40 times more likely than a pre-industrial child to survive infancy; that the Gateses have a household refrigerator and freezer (not to mention microwave oven, dishwasher, and radios and televisions); that the Gateses’s work week is only five days and that the family takes several weeks of vacation each year; that each of the Gates children will receive more than a decade of formal schooling; that the Gateses routinely travel through the air to distant lands in a matter of hours; that they effortlessly converse with people miles or oceans away; that they frequently enjoy the world’s greatest actors’ and actresses’ stunning performances; that the Gateses can, whenever and wherever they please, listen to a Beethoven piano sonata, a Puccini opera, or a Frank Sinatra ballad.

In short, what would likely most impress a visitor from the past about Bill Gates’s life are precisely those modern advantages that are not unique to Bill Gates–advantages now enjoyed by nearly all Americans.

Again, how we view wealth is all a matter of perspective.

Now having said that, like everyone else, I also have an opinion about how he should spend his wealth. I would never seriously question the merits of The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation -- because, as I pointed out, it is their money to do with as they wish. On the other hand, while many people look on with admiration at their great philanthropy, I do have to wonder, is this the best application of their wealth?

Bill Gates is one of the greatest capitalists that has ever lived. He helped create a product that didn’t exist a generation ago, one that many today could not imagine living without. In doing so, he has played a large part in the creation of millions of jobs, made hundreds of thousands of people wealthy, and increased the production of our entire society. No matter how many billions he may give away in his lifetime, this will always be his greatest contribution. The most philanthropic thing Bill Gates could do with his wealth would be to continue doing what he does best by staying in the business world and creating more wealth.