Oh, hello!
I personally believe giving money away is overrated.
Scrooge McDuck is very wealthy,
and he spends it all on himself.
- All right, go on.
That's good.
That's why you an't get a date.
One of the many reasons.
Welcome, everyone, to a brand-new top ten.
My name's Matthew Santoro, and today
it's just an all-around feel good video.
You know it's not often that we consider
the most affluent in society to be selfless.
In fact, quite often, it's the quite opposite.
I'm fairly certain Mark Zuckerberg jumps
into a pool of gold coins every morning.
But seriously, though, in a world where
the rich just get richer, and seem to leave
the rest of us behind, it's extremely
refreshing to see those who really care.
Now, of course there are the Warren Buffets of the world
that have gotten a lot of press for giving everything away,
but there are those in this world that have done the same,
and did so quietly, and you probably never knew it.
So, in this video, i'm going to tell you about
those who gave away millions upon millions
of dollars to live a more selfless life.
So here they are:
Jon Pedley was a millionaire who owned
a huge telecommunications company,
and a 1.5 million dollar farm house in Essex.
And, because of his Bruce Wayne bachelor lifestyle,
he engaged in alcohol, womanizing, and other vices.
That is until one day in 2002 when an alcohol-fueled
car accident left him on the verge of death.
However, he survived, and upon getting out
of the hospital, had a complete change of heart,
and decided to give everything he had up to charity.
He sold both his home and his business for millions,
and in 2010 used that money to move into a mud hut
in Uganda where he began a charity called J1010.
He's been living in poverty ever since,
helping both Ugandan children and British children.
A noble effort, but kind of a rash decision if you ask me.
You know,if you think about it, the real solution here
should have been to just not be a dink,
and avoid drinking and driving,
while continuing to run the business, and donate
all of the after-tax profits to the same children,
providing them with a better
living condition for years to come.
But hey, mud huts are cool too!
- Born in 1855, George Carroll grew up in Louisiana
before moving to Texas with his family.
His father created the family business of lumber companies
until George himself became head of the company.
From there, George expanded the business and his fortune,
by investing in an oil drilling company
which made him extremely wealthy.
Unfortunately there was a side effect, as the oil boom
pushed the local townspeople into a life of vice and excess.
Feeling kind of responsible for this, George decided
to use his entire fortune to combat what he had done
to his town by donating millions to both
his church and by founding a local YMCA.
After doing all of this, he eventually died at the age of 80
in the exact YMCA building that he helped build.
You know, that's kind of poetic.
I hope I die doing what I love.
One day I'll be recording a You Tube video and I'll be like,
"Hey guys, I--"
Ah!
Is that how people die?
No one ever explained these things to me.
Yevgeny Pushenko used to live
under the rule of the Soviet Union,
but after its fall in 1991,
Russians were allowed to make their own future.
So, Pushenko used his new freedom
to create his own clothing company.
Where after a short time,
it expanded making him very wealthy.
However, even with his new-found success,
Pushenko felt empty, as he had not practiced
his faith as an Orthodox Christian in years.
So one day, he met his friends over vodka,
and literally handed them the keys
to his business worth millions
His friends were left shocked by this.
But was even more shocking to them,
was to hear of his plans to become a monk
and undergo a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
And, he did.
Over the course of the next three years,
he walked 15,000 kilometers battling both weather
and suspicious authorities until he finally arrived.
Interestingly though, when he finally arrived,
he decided to change his name to Athanasius.
I've never really understood that.
Why do people change their name
when they hit some sort of major life milestone?
You know what?
When I hit 5 million subscribers here on You Tube,
I'm gonna change my name to Princess Banana Hammock.
Look out for it.
It's coming!
Born in New Castle, Brian Burnie grew up poor
in a home that didn't even have an indoor toilet.
However, he found success in construction and recruitment
and ultimately turned his 10-acre estate into
an almost 25-million dollar luxury hotel and spa.
But, when his wife was diagnosed with
breast cancer in 2004, he began
focusing directly on charity.
He eventually in 2009, sold his massive estate
and used the funds to fund his own charity
which acts to make cancer patients' lives easier.
Then in 2012, he sold what he had left,
his second and only house worth millions,
which is where he and his wife
were living after the first estate sold.
He gave that money away to fund his growing charity,
and has to be extra careful to live
off the remaining money that he has.
This is truly a beautiful gesture,
and for all the right reasons.
But seriously, does anyone really
need a 25-million dollar house?
I'm sorry, but if you need Google Maps
to navigate your own place, you overdone it!
Jeeves, I got 10 bathrooms in this place,
and I can't find one of them, man.
Help me out.
I need Google Maps.
I got an emergency!
Zell Kravinsky was the son of poor,
Russian-Jewish immigrants, but ended up making
a fortune through investing in real estate in Pennsylvania.
After being inspired by the philanthropic
work of John D. Rockefeller and Bill Gates,
he began donating money
and land to various charities in 2001.
His contributions eventually reached a whopping
45 million dollars, which was almost his entire net worth.
But that wasn't quite enough for Zel.
Oh no.
Because just a few years later, he decided
to give a kidney to a total stranger.
His generosity became so extreme, that his family
genuinely began to wonder if he was mentally ill
with even his wife threatened to leave him.
But he insists he just loves to give.
You know, Zelly.
Can I call you "Zelly"? Cool.
If you're willing to give up a kidney
to a random stranger that easily,
I highly recommend that you do not
watch the movie Seven Pounds.
Seriously, keep this dude away from that movie.
Because he's just gonna start ripping body parts off.
Chuck Feeney is an Irish-American businessman
who was born in 1931 in New jersey,
and built up his fortune through duty-free shops.
He's the founder of the Atlantic Philanthropies,
one of the largest private foundations in the world.
So you might be surprised that you've never heard of him.
Well, that's because unlike other flashy billionaires,
Chuck has discretely donated as much as
6.2 billion dollars from his empire to charities worldwide.
Now it's estimated that he has approximately
1.3 billion dollars of wealth remaining,
that he plans to give away in its entirety in 2016.
In fact, it's no secret that the wants to be penniless
before he dies, because he's made it well-known.
See? This is the way that philanthropy should be.
Not to put anyone else down, but to me,
it always means a little but less when
there's a camera in the person's face.
And now I'm going to give this water
to this poor, starving African child.
Here we go.
John, get my good side.
John, get my good side!
I want it on the...
Okay, here we go!
Percy Ross was the son of a junk dealer
in Minnesota, and lived a rough life.
That was until he purchased a plastic bag company
on the verge of bankruptcy.
The company ended up making him a fortune,
and in 1977 decided it was time to give back.
His philanthropy began relatively small,
with a donation of more than 1000 bikes
to children at a Christmas party.
But, Ross loved giving, and just one year later,
gave out nearly $20,000 to on-lookers at a local parade.
I'm making it rain!
However, all of this was still not enough, and in 1983,
he started a newspaper column called "Thanks a Million"
where he encouraged people to write in and ask for money.
That column ran in 800 newspapers for the next 16 years
where he happily gave money away
to those who he felt deserved it.
And finally, in his last column
in 1999, just before his death,
he gave out 30 million dollars, and spoke
of the true joy that he got from giving to others.
I'm sorry, that's all fantastic, but I can't get that scene
out of my head of him throwing money into a crowd.
(laughing)
An 80-year-old man making it rain on a parade crowd.
Yes, that's right, bitches!
Make it rain on your punk-asses!
Ha ha!
Tom Shadyac might not be a name that you recognize,
but you definitely know his work as the director
of Ace Ventura Pet Detective and the Nutty Professor.
Those hit films provided him with plenty
of fame and fortune during his time directing,
but deep down he wasn't happy.
That feeling was exacerbated
after a serious cycling accident in 2007.
He began thinking about his own mortality,
and decided the only way to truly live happy
was to live within your means and share your excess
with those that are less-fortunate.
So, just like that, he sold his mansions
and jets for a mobile home and a bike,
and gave the rest away to charity.
He since revealed in an interview with Oprah, of all people,
that he has never been happier, and is much happier
than when he was caught up in Hollywood.
So remember, give everything you have away,
and you get to talk to Oprah!
That's the moral of the story, right?
Chinese multi-millionaire Yu Pang-Lin
built his massive fortune through real estate and hotels.
In 2010, he announced at a banquet,
that he would donate his entire estate,
valued at 1.5 billion dollars to charity upon his death.
Now he made this choice because he didn't
want to leave anything to his two sons,
and encouraged other wealthy tycoons to do the exact same.
Now, although this seems pretty harsh,
his decision stemmed from his childhood experiences
with poverty and the struggles of being poor.
He explains that he believes that the money
he would have given to his sons
would have surely corrupted them,
and that he is certain that they will do fine on their own.
Earlier this year, Yu died at the age of 93,
and his estate was in fact donated as per his wishes.
This is another beautiful example of giving,
but I can't help but wonder how his kids feel about it.
Actually we already know.
(crying)
Daddy why?
(crying)
You may have actually heard of Frane Selak
as the luckiest unlucky person to have ever lived.
He escaped death several times including:
surviving a train wreck, a plane crash,
a bus crash, being shot, and his own car blowing up.
But it wasn't all bad luck, because in 2003,
only two days after his 73rd birthday,
he bought his first lottery ticket in over 40 years,
and yes, you guessed it, he won.
Now while most people would feel
that given the life that he's had,
he probably deserves that money.
Frane decided that in 2010 he would give
most of the money away to both relatives and charity.
He then returned to Croatia where he was born,
and now lives a much simpler life.
My guess is that Frane walks like this.
Because he's got about 10 horseshoes up his ass.
And those, my friends, were 10 extremely
rich people that gave it all way.
I hope you guys enjoyed this video, and if you did,
be sure to let me know by clicking that "Like" button,
and I'll see you all next Saturday.
Enjoy your week.
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