Mr. Gates and Mr. Buffet have persuaded 40 of the richest Americans to give half their wealth to charity. The WSJ points out here that this act almost certainly generates far less value than their productive years did. Indeed, the value of an innovators day job is vastly more productive than any charitable work that he invests in, to the point that it makes sense to pour far more money into innovation and far less into charity. But that's not the interesting question.
The real question is why Messrs Gates, Buffet and Co feel compelled to do something that they must realize won't have nearly the positive social impact that their for profit ventures have. After all they aren't stupid. My theory? Existential despair and desire for approval. Not having Christ (or hiding Him very well) their lives ultimately lack purpose. In a last desperate attempt to prove that they 'mattered' to a 'dead soulless eternity' these clever men are using all that they created to buy absolution from our secular priests. Yet they must know that these priests will be rotting in their graves soon after them.
It's despair. An act of utter existential desperation. From the richest, most powerful, most lionized people in the world. Pray for them.
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