Chapter 1
John Bloom begins Chapter 1 by urging the reader to imagine “a
world without philanthropy.” Philanthropy fuels education, research, and the arts,
which further improve society. However, this progress is difficult to measure
but undoubtedly important. Before money was created, all exchanges were done through
the act of gifting. Then, with the introduction of money people began to focus
solely on progressing themselves through monetary growth.
For a long period, philanthropy was overlooked as our
society structured itself around working to improve one’s financial status. Now,
we are seeing a resurgence of philanthropy as companies begin to acknowledge
its importance. In Bloom’s eyes, “gifting is the most important and productive
component of an economic system” in the fact that “a gift is 100% risk, while
the returns on a gift are immeasurable.” Gifting and philanthropy combat the
tendency to focus exclusively on monetary fulfillment and allow society to shit
towards a more generous and community based society.
That's cool that society is going back to more philanthropic than before. I also found this interesting because Bill Gates and Warren Buffet have promised to give away most of their fortunes; so they're definitely showing how important it is to give back.
ReplyDeleteI always believed that philanthropy is important and also a part of success. People need to realize that sometimes they need to be generous and give gifts - without expecting something in return.
ReplyDeleteI think it is super intesting that increainsly, philanthropy is being given credibility even in the profit world.
ReplyDeleteIt'd be a very interesting world if philanthropy were to be eliminated. From my perspective, anonymous philanthropy should be urged and be given higher importance due to the fact that people would genuinely give back from the goodness of their hearts instead of doing to generate positive publicity from media sources.
ReplyDeleteVery intriguing how philanthropy has evolved overtime.
ReplyDeleteIt's great to see contemporary societies value philanthropy. It sorts of act like a moral obligation.
ReplyDeleteI am ok with this argument however I feel this could easily be misread as proof for European Socialism. Which I am still mixed about.
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