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UPDATED: July 23, 2010 NO. 29, JULY 22, 2010
Should There Be a Minimum for Billionaires’ Donations?
Should it be made mandatory for Chinese billionaires to donate at least 1 million yuan ($147,000) a year to charity?
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Whether an annual donation of 1 million yuan is an appropriate benchmark for billionaires' social responsibility is debatable. Billionaires shouldn't reject the suggestion on the ground corruption has not been eliminated.

Unnecessary bottom line

Zou Xi (www.hanminzu.com): Every citizen and organization should take on their social responsibilities, which have both material and spiritual dimensions. To measure the fulfillment of social responsibility by the standard of cash donations alone is too pragmatic. A donation should be totally voluntary while donating to show one's sense of social responsibility is questionable even if the money does go to charitable causes.

A person's sense of social responsibility should be judged on his or her daily conduct. As for billionaires, if they run their enterprises successfully, take good care of their employees, obey all the laws and regulations and pay taxes on time, how can you say that they have no sense of social responsibility even if they don't donate a penny to society?

We should encourage wealthy people to donate to charitable causes to repay the community since that's where their wealth comes from. Helping all members of a community to live harmoniously together is also a virtue and complies with developmental trends in human society. But the means of repayment should be up to the choice of the benefactors, who shouldn't be forced to make a donation. By taking advantage of freer access to the media, some celebrities are going to pollute the social environment for donors and cause distortion about a bottom line that is moral—and that should be prevented.

Lian Peng (Daily Sunshine): Behind the wealthy people's lack of enthusiasm in donating to charitable causes are deep-rooted management loopholes. Some millionaires or billionaires who want to repay society find themselves short of channels. In 2009, a domestic magazine conducted a survey on 792 private entrepreneurs with personal assets of more than 10 million yuan ($1.47 million). As many as 64.2 percent were not satisfied with the effects of their donations due to the lack of transparency, while 9 percent of respondents seldom donated money to charity.

Undeniably, due to a lack of transparency in charity operations, a lot of donations have been embezzled by government departments or pocketed by corrupt officials instead of being spent on meaningful programs.

We shouldn't criticize the mercilessness of the rich by claiming to have high moral standards or wage a war against the rich by setting a standard for billionaires' donations.

Promoting a culture of charity in China does not only require the establishment of charity operations by capable organizations and individuals, but also the creation of a favorable environment for charitable organizations, such as offering citizens tax breaks for donating to charitable causes.

Liang Jiangtao (Hefei Evening News): In China, there have appeared a good number of models of morality who contribute generously to charitable causes in recent years. But the development of philanthropic donations is not without handicaps. First, the management of donated money and items has to be improved. Second, there have been scandals where donors write rubber checks for publicity's sake or make donations because of moral blackmail. These scandals make the public suspect donations to charity are often linked to exterior motives.

Charitable donations need to be supported by a favorable social environment. The top priority is to involve greater numbers of individuals, including billionaires, in charitable causes. This does not mean setting a limit for donations but creating a viable system of regulation of charity that will boost everyone's confidence in charitable causes.

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