More than 250 wealthy people have signed the Giving Pledge, a promise to dedicate a majority of their wealth to philanthropy. But many haven’t followed through on it, spurring criticism from one of the Giving Pledge’s founders, Melinda French Gates.
“Have they given enough? No,” French Gates said in an interview with Wired published in December 2025, referring to her fellow billionaire class and those who have signed the Giving Pledge.
But one philanthropist has gone above and beyond without even signing the Giving Pledge: George Soros, the 95-year-old Hungarian-American investor and political donor.
He founded Soros Fund Management and the Open Society Foundations, a network of international charities supporting democracy, human rights, and social reform. He’s committed more than $32 billion to philanthropy since 1984, and is one of the most generous philanthropists in the world. According to Forbes, he’s given away a whopping 76% of his net worth, beating out Warren Buffett, who has given away 30% of his. To be sure, Buffett has donated a higher dollar amount, totaling more than $60 billion.
But many billionaire philanthropists haven’t given away nearly that much money or that percentage of their wealth. Fifteen years into the Giving Pledge, a July 2025 report from the Institute for Policy Studies found just one living couple among the original 57 signatories—John and Laura Arnold—has actually given away half of their wealth. The report labeled the pledge “unfulfilled, unfulfillable, and not our ticket to a fairer, better future.”
