17 More Wealthy Families Commit to Give at Least Half Their Wealth to Charity

America’s cheerleaders for billionaire philanthropy have turned up new recruits.

Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett will announce today that 17 more wealthy individuals and families have pledged to give at least half their fortunes to charity.

Among the people who agreed to follow the “Giving Pledge” promoted by Mr. Buffett and the Gates are the financier Carl Icahn and the Facebook co-founders Dustin Moskovitz and Mark Zuckerberg. They join 40 billionaire families and individuals who said in August they would commit to giving that share of their money away.

While far fewer people signed the pledge this fall than over the summer, Ms. Gates said that should not be seen as a sign that enthusiasm about the pledge has waned.

“There’s incredible momentum,” she said. “We’re never going to get absolutely everybody on the [Forbes 400] list. We have to be realistic. What we want to do is get a crux of people.”

The bad economy, she said, hasn’t been as big an obstacle to persuading people to give as she had anticipated.

The new donors unveiled today have a combined net worth of more than $39-billion. They include three co-founders of financial company Bloomberg LP and their wives (Charles and Merryl Snow Zegar, Thomas and Cindy Secunda, and Duncan and Nancy MacMillan), as well as people who have already committed much of their money to charity, such as T. Denny Sanford (chairman of financial company United National Corporation), Sidney Kimmel (chairman of Jones Apparel Group), and Steve and Jean Case (of AOL). Among the less well-known names, at least to nonprofit leaders, may be Nicolas Berggruen, a Paris-born businessman who recently started a nonprofit to improve California’s government. Others on the list are Lyda Hill, who founded a travel agency; Theodore Forstmann, who runs the company IMG; Morningstar founder Joseph Mansueto and his wife, Rika; the financier Michael Milken and his wife, Lori; the energy magnate George P. Mitchell; David and Barbara Green, who founded Hobby Lobby Stores; and the investor Leon Cooperman and his wife, Toby.

A Snowball Effect

People who work in philanthropy said the new crop of donors is heartening, even if the Gateses and Mr. Buffett haven’t exactly transformed the country’s billionaires into philanthropists overnight.

Robert Carter, vice chairman of Changing Our World, which provides fund raising and other advice to nonprofits, called the effort a success so far and said he was “happy to be alive to see it.”

Some nonprofit experts are concerned, though, about how quickly the pledges might translate into new gifts and how much of an impact the money will have. Many people on the list have already committed much of their fortunes to charity. Meanwhile, some critics worry that the money will go almost exclusively to universities, hospitals, and other nonprofits that typically reap the biggest donations.

Ms. Gates said the Giving Pledge isn’t about directing people how to give. But she said that bringing donors together will have a snowball effect.

“As people start to give and get involved, they will come up with even more creative ways,” she said. “We’re seeing people on this list say, Oh, I didn’t know so-and-so gave to charter schools. I want to ask them what they’ve learned.”

Ms. Gates cited Mr. Zuckerberg’s recent $100-million pledge to Newark, N.J., public schools as an example of innovative giving. She and her husband didn’t influence how he gave that money, she said, but they talked with the 26-year-old over the summer about the pledge and when he’d like to sign on.

Ms. Gates said that Mr. Zuckerberg and Mr. Moskovitz’s approach to giving has taken her back to her early days in philanthropy.

“Bill and I have really been amazed by how much they’re asking the questions that we asked at the beginning,” she said.

A Gathering for Donors

Ms. Gates, along with her husband, Mr. Buffett, and other Giving Pledge members, will continue their fund-raising appeals next year. Perhaps this spring, she said, they’ll have another round of donors to announce.

Eventually, when the Giving Pledge attracts more people (there is no firm target) they plan to hold a formal gathering, Ms. Gates said. Meanwhile, less formal dinners and meetings among people who have signed the pledge are continuing.

And, fund raisers hope, some big new gifts will follow.

Said Changing Our World’s Mr. Carter: “Announcing some kind of pledge is one thing, but actually paying it and doing the work—that’s the excitement, because that’s where the real return on investment is.”