A new analysis describes a third wave of American philanthropy fueled by AI equity stakes including the OpenAI Foundation's 26% holding valued at roughly $220 billion

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One of the most important and under appreciated trends in the world right now.

1. 100s of billions of dollars will soon be available to solve big problems (making the world resilient to ASI, ending factory farming, etc). 2. The projects and organizations which will turn billions of 2027/28 dollars into impact need to be started NOW. 3. We need really talented people to start and run and work for these new projects. What @nanransohoff calls general managers, who feel personally resposible for solving one of the world’s important problems.

What is especially scarce are detailed visions about what making AI go well looks like. These will help inform what problems these new projects ought to work on.

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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REPLIES110

roon@tszzl

it will be very hard to productively spend this scale of philanthropic capital effectively, it seems already quite hard

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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Patrick Collison@patrickc

Important post.

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

https://nanransohoff.substack.com/p/the-third-wave-of-american-philanthropy

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rohit@krishnanrohit

Ideas. For $35b a year you could create and run 5 new Harvards

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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Logan Graham@logangraham

Within ~2 years, there might be >0.5 Manhattan Projects worth of philanthropic $$$ to spend on the biggest challenges, like cyber or biodefense.

@nanransohoff is right: the hard part is finding enough good organizations to spend the $.

You should build one!

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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Sholto Douglas@_sholtodouglas

Very good essay

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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Alexander Berger@albrgr

Characteristically great post from Nan. Most people are really sleeping on the importance of the OpenAI Foundation - it's already displaced Gates as the biggest foundation in the country by assets.

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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@timnitGebru (@dair-community.social/bsky.social)@timnitGebru

Students are booing out of touch execs selling this shit, here in the real world, and the effective altruists say we’re about to hit utopia not only because of the impending machine god, but also their billionaires who’re about to get rich from OpenAI & Anthropic IPOs saving the world with their money 🙄

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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Beff (e/acc)@beffjezos

Capitalism is literally a democratic allocation of capital.

The people have way more bits of control over allocation of capital towards solving problems.

In this case, all this philanthropy will be way more democratic than letting a few in power have the decision monopoly

Dean W. Ball@deanwball

The answer to this strikes me as obvious: “yes.”

Presumably OP is not saying, “this wealth should be spent on Porsches and Pateks instead of being spent on philanthropy!” Rather she seems to be hinting that the government should expropriate this wealth and spend it on <?????>. That’s what “in a democracy” is usually code for in contexts like this, by the way. It’s code for giving the government more money and power. Ironic, given the origins of American democracy.

Anyway, no, the government would have no idea what to spend this money on. Statistically speaking, this fortune, in the hands of the state, would most likely be squandered on old people’s retirement benefits, interest on debt, and weapons. “In a democracy.”

There are a ton of important things we will need to invest in to “make AI go well.” Long-range, bold, ambitious investments made by prudent and wise people. I do not know what species of delusion one must have to believe that the US government is well positioned to serve that role. America is fortunate to have a private sector and civil society that at least has a fighting chance of being up to the task.

There are many things I hope government will do during the AI transformation, but the expropriation gestured at below needs much more thought and justification than “in a democracy”-style sloganeering.

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Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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John Wolthuis@thuddwhirr

I shudder at the thought of this level of capital getting thoughtlessly tossed over the wall to the same pool of counterproductive non-profits as happened in the last wave. We can’t repeat the CZI/Bezos Earth Fund era.

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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🇨🇦halogen@halogen1048576

@nanransohoff yeah um they're effective altruists so they're just going to pay their friends millions to write a few white papers about science fiction

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Kumar Garg@KumarAGarg

Strongly agree.

A big part of @RenPhilanthropy work is to build out the ecosystem of field-leaders and thesis-driven philanthropic funds to effectively absorb and deploy this coming surge of capital.

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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Ryan Kidd@ryan_kidd44

@nanransohoff @MATSprogram has just launched a Founding & Field-Building track for our field-leading AI safety & security program! https://www.matsprogram.org/track/founding-and-field-building

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The Sightsmith@thesightsmith

It will all be absorbed into fraudulent NGO's and non-profits run by the wives, children and cronies of these people. No person in need will be helped. And certainly the everday Americans who are increasingly alienated and nihilistic about their birthright being stolen to enrich these so-called elites will not see a dollar. Everyone knows it's a joke and it will just massively fan the flames of resentment.

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Jassi Pannu@JassiPannuMD

One way to achieve @nanransohoff’s vision is for philanthropies to acquire mission-oriented startups, giving them unconstrained capital to do their thing.

@biohub has done this with @EvoscaleAI, reorienting a top team to providing public goods.

Nan Ransohoff@nanransohoff

New blog post: The third wave of American philanthropy

Hundreds of billions of dollars in new philanthropic capital will soon become liquid. The OpenAI Foundation holds 26% of OpenAI, worth about $220B at today’s valuation. Anthropic’s seven co-founders have pledged to give away 80% of their wealth and have instituted the most aggressive donor matching program for employees in tech history.

How much does this all add up to? And how meaningful is that in the context of philanthropy today?

I was doing some simple napkin math to wrap my head around the scale of what’s coming, and radicalized myself in the process. I had dramatically underappreciated the scale of the philanthropic capital that’s about to become available and the corresponding gap in talent and organizations that will be needed to make the most of it.

This piece aims to directionally sketch the scale of what’s coming, the gap in operational capacity needed to absorb it, and what we can do to fill it.

(Link to full post in reply)

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jessica dai@jessicadai_

I'd maybe deprioritize, checks notes, 5000 thinktanks or the nth nonprofit "alignment" "research" institute but, really, what do I know

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Alexis Ohanian 🗽@alexisohanian

Great report! I've learned a lot since I started my foundation 4 years ago and I'm so impressed by how folks like @patrickc have built philanthropic endeavors that have the hallmarks of high-performing startups. We need these now more than ever https://nanransohoff.substack.com/p/the-third-wave-of-american-philanthropy

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Sarah Cone@sarah_cone

@nanransohoff Strongly agree! Just wrote this:

https://ssir.org/articles/entry/philanthropy-new-gilded-age

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