Over the last two years, MacKenzie Scott has repeatedly made headlines for the incredible rate at which she is donating her sizable wealth. Married to Amazon boss Jeff Bezos till 2019, Scott is a novelist and, at one point of time, the world's wealthiest woman. Now, she is once again making headlines, this time for her marriage to a Seattle schoolteacher.
"In a stroke of happy coincidence, I am married to one of the most generous and kind people I know—and joining her in a commitment to pass on an enormous financial wealth to serve others," wrote Seattle-based science teacher Dan Jewett in a letter uploaded on the website of the nonprofit organization Giving Pledge.
Reports suggest that Jewett is a chemistry teacher at the private Lakeside School in Washington that Scott's children attend. Their 'pledger' page now appears to have been combined with both their names and a picture of the two together.
For the uninitiated, Giving Pledge is an initiative founded by Warren Buffet, and Bill and Melinda Gates. It encourages extremely wealthy people to contribute a majority of their wealth to philanthropic causes, and presently has over 200 signatories from various countries.
She had been heavily involved in the formation and development of Amazon, and her divorce settlement left Scott with Amazon stock worth $35.6 billion. In 2020, Scott became the wealthiest woman in the world as the company's shares soared. At the same time, she has also emerged as one of the biggest philanthropists in the world, donating billions of dollars to hundreds of organisations.
As the COVID-19 pandemic spread across the US in 2020, Scott donated more than $4 billion in four months, spread across 384 organizations in all 50 states of the US. This is not an isolated effort. A signatory to Giving Pledge, Scott donated nearly $6 billion in 2020.
