That was kind of a brain fart. I was thinking of minimizing the amount I give the government, don’t know how I turned it around to that. Out of curiosity I checked with my wife who works for a large non-profit, she doesn’t think it’s possible either.
What the fuck would I do with $100 million? I’m keeping a million or two, but the rest goes.
Charity begins at home, doncha know.
But I think I could fork over up to 10% to some of my favorite causes.
15% or so. Another 2 percent to relatives (considering I haven’t met most of my relatives and I’d probably dislike some of them, I’d give only to ensure an upper-middle class life, assuming they are to be trusted with it). I’d spend a few million dollars on a house and so forth (which would count as benefitting my immediate family and another 5 percent or so I suppose), and then invest or save the rest.
Whatever my tax advisor recommends.
My plan has always been to give at least some to charities, ones I personally support, and that’s the part for which I chose (10-20%). But I’d also invest in local businesses, support kickstarter-ish projects, put together my own business to help employ and therefore support a lot of my friends who are struggling. I’d also like to be philanthropic more directly, in a Warren Buffett kind of way.
I’ve given way more thought to this than anyone who doesn’t buy lottery tickets should.
If I won 100 million, that would be much more than I’d ever be able to spend on myself and my family without living in a way I don’t want to. My family would be able to live very comfortably on the income from 20 million dollars, even very conservatively invested.
As for the restrictions, I don’t imagine that I’d be better at providing help for people than established charities are. If I couldn’t find charities that were doing what I wanted to do, I’d register my own, but it takes a whole lot of management to give away large amounts of money, so it would make sense for me to find people who are already doing it well.
I would give much away, in varying ways. For parents and siblings I would buy their houses or pay off their mortgages, education funds for all the kids. I would give out a lot of small business loans, and of course my husband would probably start a new business where we hire a lot of people. Breakfast programs for schools. Yes a lot of it would be given away, but not in one lump sum to any one particular agency and only to small local agencies who spend more on doing things than administration. Fortunately I won’t be working for wages so I will have time to investigate things.
Beta Centauri Institute of Technology?
I’ve thought about this before and I would no doubt give most of it away. That kind of money could pay my bills but it would no doubt seperate me from my friends and family. Not only that, but I’d have to look over my shoulder the rest of my life from people trying to rob me.
I’d give it away. www.Kiva.com would be a great place to start. Does giving away money to my friends count as a charity? Because that’s where the lion share would be going. I think you could almost be an overnight celebrity. The first lottery winner in history to do the noble thing. It could hopefully set a trend. Because it’s not money that people want, it’s attention.
Giving found/lottery money to an existing charity wouldn’t even occur to me. But I’d still like to do charitable things. Maybe go eccentric with it by giving away full college rides to 10 brown-haired high schoolers named Rachel who play the saxophone… shit like that.
You gotta figure the odds.
If the $100MM is post-tax (or for some reason non-taxable). Then I’d set it up this way:
Step #1: It all goes into a non-profit trust of which I am the sole trustee.
Then:
$15MM to provide income for myself. Using annuities it becomes ~ $40,000/month in perpetuity
$20MM for an innovation center. Investing to help create new businesses in my region. I get a piece of the action. Never hurts to hedge one’s bets with breaking technology.
$30MM for the Jonathan Chance STEM scholarship fund. Let’s produce engineers, scientists and so forth. That Warp Drive won’t invent itself!
$10MM for a trust for my girls. That should generate more than $100,000/year for both of them. This can also pay for college. It’s enough for them to have very comfortable lives without becoming empty parasites. Warren Buffet’s rule applies, “Give your children enough so they can do anything, but not so much that they can do nothing.”
$20MM for the Jonathan Chance Charitable Endowment. This provides assistance to the arts and other things that catch my attention as not receiving the attention/support they need. Maybe pay my local NPR station to skip the fundraising drive for once. That sort of thing.
$5M to pay off mortgages, student loans, other debt for family and friends.
Break it up among five different investment brokers (God knows I know some…I am one, again) and give them different orders depending on what their particular goal is.
Note, also, that for almost all of these splits, the idea is that the principle never gets touched. So plans will need to be made for successor trustees upon my passing.
I wouldn’t feel guilty passing by the Salvation Army or Santa Claus street beggars like I do now. I’d throw them a dollar and not miss it.
I’d donate some of it to specific charities, but I’ve also got a big project that I’d want to get off the ground first. I’d probably set aside $5 million for family, $2.5 million for friends, $2.5 million for me, and the remainder would be split between the business and charity. And of course, if the business turned a profit, that would mean there’s more money for charity.
I said 1-10% because I was thinking about existing charities. We do give to a couple of local charities now, and I’d love to be able to support them with more. There are a few organizations I’d be willing to give some money, but I’d definitely figure out a way to do it without my name ending up on a bazillion mailing lists.
My husband and I have always said that if we ever hit a big lottery (unlikely, since we rarely play any more) we’d set up scholarships, and we’d probably make donations to certain schools. We feel strongly about education, especially in science and technology. Sorry, Lit majors - you’re on your own. 
But it’d be great to set up well-equipped labs in middle schools and high schools and get kids excited about science. I don’t think that counts as charity, but it’d be our way of doing something good with our money.
If hookers and blow can be considered charity, then 100%.
I have lots of family and friends who need help.
Charity begins at home.
I said 1-10 percent because in reality, that’s quite a lot. That’s 1-10 million dollars.
0%.
I said 10% but in all reality that is just a minimum. I would likely give more. I don’t desire a huge home, fancy car, or any grown up toys. I mainly want to be able to travel.