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Bill Gates No Longer World's Richest Man
alphadogg writes "Riding surging prices of his various telecom holdings, including giant mobile outfit America Movil, Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim Helu has beaten out Americans Bill Gates and Warren Buffett to become the wealthiest person on earth and nab the top spot on the 2010 Forbes list of the World's Billionaires." I'd still let the guy buy me dinner if he's ever in my town. He's probably still good for it even though he's fallen on hard times.
And now, the $0.5 million question: How much money does Gates give to charity?
According to the Wikipedia page on the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the foundation donates $1.5 billion per year. And a BusinessWeek estimate lists Gates as having donated $28.1 billion over his whole life.
No, you can't. That's flat out wrong. This is a common misunderstanding of the progressive tax system. Just because your maximum bracket is 35% doesn't mean you pay 35% on your entire income. You pay 35% on the income *above* the previous bracket. Anything below that line is taxed at the lower brackets. For 2009, the first $8,350 of a single person's income is taxed at 10%, then 15% for the amount between $8,351– $33,950, 25% for $33,951 – $82,250, etc. This is the case no matter how much they earn.
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Look here is the plain truth:
Slim was rich before he bought telmex. Around 100 times poorer than he is now, but Im sure you or I could be 100 times poorer than him and still live happy and full lives for us and our descendants (we would own round 500 million bucks!). Slim bought telmex though from President Carlos Salinas (from his government, it was a state owned telephone company which sucked even more than it does now and BOY, does it SUCK NOW), for if I remember correctly round 2000 million dollars, on credit. Which is in its face ridiculous if its the local telephone monopoly of a country of a 100 million people.... and you can see it in the numbers. Telmex sold that ammount every year or two I think, even in its early stages. Right now, Slims empire is MUCH larger than that since they own the cellphone market in many, many latam countries.
Here in Mexico EVERYONE know that its MOST probable that Salinas, the expresident, had his cut from that deal. But we also know that Slim generally has a simple profit minded stance on just about anything. At least he is not crying because gay marriage was aproved for mexico city like other conservative rich men here, at least he gives to the politicall parties and politicians only with profit in mind and not because of an ideological agenda. Belive me, entrepreneurs in Mexico are every bit as crooked when it comes to giving or taking from the government AND they tend to have a moralist agenda. Slim doesnt do that and, for that, at least I am gratefull at least until we finish fixing this fucking country for good.
NO SIG