Melinda French Gates
Source of wealth: Microsoft
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Biography
Melinda French Gates is one of the most powerful women in philanthropy. In 2024, she resigned as co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation after a nearly 24-year run.
French Gates did not give a reason for leaving the Gates Foundation; however, Bill and Melinda Gates divorced in 2021.
Forbes estimates her settlement from the 2021 divorce was $25 billion.
French Gates has doubled down on her previous commitment to support women's and girls' rights, announcing in 2024 a $1 billion donation through 2026 to the cause.
French Gates also aims to close the funding gap for female founders through her investing, advocacy and philanthropic firm Pivotal Ventures.
Perspective on their fortune
Gold
Everyday luxury
A Melinda French Gates's fortune is equivalent to 202 of gold, but this may be difficult to value, as we don't usually have a handful of gold bars in our piggy bank.
A standard gold ring typically weighs between 4 and 7 grams. Let's say this one weighs 5 grams. It's usually 18k gold.
Based on today's gold price (not taking into account the jeweler's fee, shipping, or anything else), that gold ring would be worth $556.3
Melinda French Gates could buy 53,980,485 gold rings. That's a lot of fingers and a lot of gifts!!
And if the number of rings is difficult to visualize, all these rings would need 10 trucks to transport them, But we can be almost certain that Melinda French Gates will have enough left over to pay for the gas for those trucks.
Health
The price of life
Let's compare Melinda French Gates's fortune with the healthcare spending of a huge country
Melinda French Gates could fund the entire healthcare system of DR Congo with a population of over 105,800,000 of inhabitants for approximately 13.5 years.
But even if we compare their fortune to that of a rich country
At the other extreme, Melinda French Gates could cover the health expenditure of Luxembourg, considered the world's most heavily invested health system, for 6.0 years
Education
Buying the future
Lowest education spending
Melinda French Gates could assume the entire cost of the education system of Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, with more than 243,000,000 inhabitants for 8.8 years.
Highest education spending
But not only could he assume the cost of a poor country, Luxembourg is considered the country with the highest per capita investment in education in the world, Melinda French Gates could pay for it in full for 12.0 years.
Research
The monopoly of progress
Lowest research spending
Melinda French Gates could fully fund the state research budget of Pakistan, the fifth most populous country in the world with more than 260,000,000 of inhabitants, for 50.6 years.
Highest research spending
But even if we compare the total wealth of Melinda French Gates with Israel, the country that currently invests the most per capita in research in the world, it could assume the total cost of the system for 1.1 years.
Financial Assets
Monthly wealth history
Fortune comparison
Historical data not available for comparison