I have been pondering wealth and philanthropy.  I just read Steve Jobs biography, great book, lots of history.  Jobs was wealthy but not that interested in philanthropy.  His friend, Larry Ellison, is fantastically wealthy, but seems to put his wealth into estates, sail boats, airplanes and the like.  I haven't heard of an Oracle Hospital, or an Apple Orphanage.  Bill Gates, though, is a philanthropist.  I usually only hear about his African endeavors.  Can you imagine is Gates and Ellison funded a giant scholarship fund for promising high school students to study in fields that G&E favored?  Maybe they do. 

In the Gilded Age, when the US had similarly wealthy people, Carnegie and Mellon competed with each other in their philanthropic achievements.  Then they joined forces, Carnegie-Mellon University.  Pittsburgh is littered with parks, museums, libraries and the like funded by one of these guys.

I think the US public would be more forthcoming with tax-breaks for the wealthy if we saw more projects like these.