More than 250 wealthy people have signed the Giving Pledge, a pledge to give the majority of their wealth to charity. But many did not follow through, prompting criticism from Giving Pledge co-founder Melinda French Gates.
“Did they give enough? No,” French Gates said in an interview with the publication. Wired published December 2025 and refers to her fellow billionaires and those who have signed the Giving Pledge.
But one philanthropist has gone above and beyond even signing the Giving Pledge: George Soros, a 95-year-old Hungarian-American investor and political donor.
He founded the Soros Foundation and the Open Society Foundation, a network of international philanthropies supporting democracy, human rights and social reform. Since 1984, he has given more than $32 billion to charity and is one of the most generous philanthropists in the world. According to Forbeshe gave away a whopping 76% of his wealth, beating Warren Buffett, who gave away 30% of his wealth. Of course, Buffett donated a larger sum of over $60 billion.
But many billionaire philanthropists haven’t given away nearly as much money or that percentage of their wealth. An Institute for Policy Studies report published in July 2025, fifteen years after the Giving Pledge was adopted, found that only one living couple among the original 57 signatories—John and Laura Arnold—actually gave away half of their wealth. The report calls the promise “unfulfilled, unenforceable and not our ticket to a fairer and better future.”
Part of the problem is simple math. The 32 original U.S. mortgagors who are still billionaires are about 283% richer since signing, as their fortunes grow faster than they can give them away, according to IPS. This is evident in Mackenzie Scott’s paradox. Even though she has become one of the most prolific philanthropists of our time, having given away $26 billion, her net worth continues to rise thanks to the strength of the Amazon shares she received after her divorce from founder Jeff Bezos.
Meanwhile, roughly 80% of Giving Pledge donors’ contributions went to private foundations and donor-advised funds—funds that can store wealth for years without transferring it to operating charities. However, a Giving Pledge spokesperson called the IPS report “misleading” due to the exclusion of gifts to foundations, saying CNBC in 2025, the pledge “has helped create new norms of generosity.”
Of course, Soros himself channels his donations through his network of foundations. But the money mostly went out the door: Forbes In 2024, it is estimated to have distributed $21 billion of the $32 billion it has allocated. And his funds continue to spend money. In May, Open Society pledged another $300 million over five years to protect democratic rights and economic security in the United States, even as the Trump administration singled out the Soros family for scrutiny.
“We continue our work unabated,” said Laleh Ispahani, managing director of the Open Society Foundations in the United States. AP. “We will not be intimidated into silence.”
Why does George Soros give away so much of his money?
Soros’s own explanations for why he gives money have always been rooted in his history. He was born in Budapest in 1930 and lived through the Nazi occupation, which killed more than 500,000 Hungarian Jews. His family survived by obtaining false documents and helping others do the same.
“1944, the year of the German occupation, was my formative experience,” Soros said in a statement. “Instead of submitting to our fate, we resisted an evil force that was much stronger than us – and yet we prevailed.”
This experience shaped his lifelong concern with what he calls an open society. In January 2025, then-President Joe Biden awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.