Billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott is remarried after her sincere divorce from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
In a letter posted on the website of the philanthropic organization The Giving Pledge on Saturday, Dan Jewett, a science teacher at the prestigious Seattle School who attended her children, said he was’ grateful for the extraordinary privilege of to work with. to give away assets with the potential to do as much good as shared. ”
What could otherwise be a completely private, personal decision takes on unusual significance in light of Scott’s resources – $ 53 billion according to Forbes’ latest estimate – and her stated intention to give away the majority of them.
In addition to the note on the Giving Pledge website, Ms. Scott, a published novelist, edited her author page on the Amazon website to read: “She lives in Seattle with her four children and her husband, Dan.”
The Giving Pledge was started in 2010 by software tycoon Bill Gates, his wife, Melinda, and billionaire investor Warren Buffett. Signatories agree to give away the majority of their wealth.
For Mrs Scott, her remarriage is the latest twist in a life where she has quietly but firmly set the boundaries of her own privacy. Instead of remaining anonymous in her donation, she chose to announce nearly $ 6 billion in grants and gifts last year in a few posts on the website Medium.
‘I call this discrete transparency. It is basically transparency, but entirely on the terms of the donors, ”said Benjamin Soskis, a senior research fellow at the Center for Nonprofits and Philanthropy at the Urban Institute. “It gives a simulation of transparency, but it’s still completely discretionary.”
Me. Scott takes a unique place in the world of mega-philanthropy. She does not have the decades of experience that Mr. Gates or the former mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York built up. But by the sheer speed and scope of her donations, and the way she gave her gifts with some of the very restrictive conditions and heavy reporting requirements that became commonplace, Ms. Scott managed to get the debate going in the direction of the field.
She has given extensive chapters to YMCA and YWCA chapters across the country, to food banks and historic black colleges and universities. She has made donations to organizations that support women’s rights, LGBTQ equality and efforts to combat climate change and racial inequality.
Her influence was evident in a report released jointly by the groups Candid and the Center for Disaster Philanthropy last week. The groups found that $ 4 billion of the $ 6 billion that Mrs. Scott gave away last year, can be considered a pandemic reaction, accounting for nearly three-quarters of Covid-19-related donations by billionaires and other individuals with high net worth.
“She made a huge impact,” said Grace Sato, director of research at Candid. “The way she gave varied the trends in what we saw.”
The Wall Street Journal first reported the remarriage of Ms. Scott reported.
Me. Scott spent 25 years with Mr. Bezos married. They divorced in 2019 and her share in the divorce agreement was 4 percent of Amazon’s stock. While her ex-husband became a tabloid mainstay after their divorce, while hanging out with fellow magnates and celebrities on super yachts, Ms Scott mostly stayed out of the spotlight.
In a statement, Mr. Bezos said, “Dan is such a wonderful guy, and I’m happy and excited for both of them.”
It is unclear when Scott and Mr. Jewett is married. In the publicity surrounding her donation last year, she did not comment on him. Her representatives did not respond to requests for comment.
“In a happy coincidence,” he said. Jewett wrote in his letter to the giving promise page, ‘I’m married to one of the most generous and kind people I know – and commit her to a commitment to pass on an enormous financial wealth to serve others . ‘
“I do not think it is so surprising to me that she added her husband,” said Debra Mesch, a professor at the Women’s Philanthropy Institute at Indiana University. She says: ‘We are a couple now and our household will be together. ‘This is what many couples do. ”
Mr. Jewett described himself as a ‘teacher for the majority in my life’, declaring the strangeness of a statement of his intentions, ‘since I have never attempted to amass the kind of wealth necessary to feel that such a thing would not be special. meaning. ” Mr. Jewett teaches at Lakeside School, which Mr. Gates counts among his prominent alumni.
Mr. Soskis, of the Urban Institute, said the events that led to decision-making came to life late, with a focus on retirement and death, in the form of bequests. Leading philanthropists are now much younger and are addressing a new range of issues. Priscilla Chan and her husband, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, cite the birth of their daughter as a motivating factor in their giving.
‘The fact that giving now takes place in the prime of life means that giving decisions and giving stories are shaped by different life cycle events such as divorce and marriage and birth in a way that was not really the case 30 to 40 years ago. was not. , “Mr. Soskis said.
Jack Beggcontributed research.