Quotes About Philanthropy

A lot of people measure a man by what he's got. I've decided to measure myself by what I can give up.

There is the eternal war between those who are in the world for what they can get out of it... and those who are in the world to make it a better place for everybody to live in.

Have you ever wondered why Republicans are so interested in encouraging people to volunteer in their communities? It's because volunteers work for no pay. Republicans have been trying to get people to work for no pay for a long time.

But we all know the wag's definition of a philanthropist: a man whose charity increases directly as the square of the distance.

Camila Batmanghelidjh of Kids Company - what a wonderful woman.

To me, the money is - it's certainly a wonderful thing. But it is in direct proportion to how you're able to bless yourself and bless others with it.

The Grateful Dead were very kind. It was Santa Claus. It did good things. It allowed other people to benefit. The benefits that we played were enormous, and we played free. So you've got a band that loves to play free, and that was a wonderful thing.

Obviously, a lot of non-profits live on donations, and that's a wonderful thing. But higher education can't exist on donations only because, if that were the case, we would have a hard time paying teachers adequate salaries.

When we started out, I kept wondering, what are the rules of philanthropy? And it turns out that there are rules for it. And nobody could talk about that. There is no set formula for this because anything with a human being cannot have a formula.

In my view, a philanthropist is anyone who gives anything - time, money, experience, skills or networks - in any amount, to create a better world. This is not how we once thought about philanthropy. The word used to conjure up something rather passive - sitting down and writing checks.

I've a problem with the word charity because I think that NGOs, as I prefer calling them, really do take the work of moral and social responsibilities that ought to be taken on by governments.

I want to make the most out of the word 'fame.' I want to do good things with my fame, or whatever it is. I want to help and do charity work.

I want to be a force for real good. In other words. I know that there are bad forces, forces that bring suffering to others and misery to the world, but I want to be the opposite force. I want to be the force which is truly for good.

Apart from being motivation for themselves, I think big givers should also talk about their philanthropy so that their work and their success stories prove inspirational enough for many others to follow.

I think it's the strength of the idea that's made Donors Choose work, not me. I mean, I'm determined, and I work hard, but so does everyone else.

I've helped many, many, many children, thousands of children, cancer kids, leukemia kids.

I give away thousands of paintings for free.

Society needs hundreds of hundreds of thousands of Chen Guangbiaos.

I have anonymously helped many thousands.

When I first entered the corporate world, doing good and making money were seen as separate and contradictory threads. Challenging that notion set my career - and life - on a new course.

You can only do three things with your money. You can spend it. You can invest it. Or you can give it away. And if you invest it, you're really just getting more money to give away or buy something. How many things can you buy? So I don't really think there's a lot of choices.

He who gives what he would as readily throw away, gives without generosity; for the essence of generosity is in self sacrifice.

If you look hard at it, if you look hard at the bleeding heart attitude to always throw money at issues, throw money at problems, what you're in fact probably saying is you're exercising a prejudicism of low expectations.

In philanthropy, many of us give a little bit and each year we give more and more to see what actually works and not just throw money out there and see if it's going to work. If the government did the same thing, fabulous.