Wealthy Professionals Step Up Giving

Doctors, scientists, and other professionals have found more opportunity than ever to become very rich very quickly, a situation that has many looking to philanthropy as an outlet for their newfound wealth, reports The New York Times.

As money in the United States has become concentrated in the upper-income tax brackets, multimillion-dollar gifts have become almost common, says the article, partly because many of the newly rich feel uncomfortable with their social status.

Fighting AIDS and poverty, as well as supporting colleges and universities, tend to be the most popular causes among such donors, the newspaper says.

Others argue that doctors, for instance, who give up research to make money on Wall Street, and then give much of that money away to health groups, make a greater contribution to science than they would have otherwise.

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