Michael Bloomberg brings the same approach to giving away money as he does to making it. From a fortune amassed by providing precise information to the financial services industry, he has so far donated more than $21 billion to causes ranging from climate to education to the arts.
Last year alone, Bloomberg gave $3.7 billion, making him 2024’s largest individual donor, according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy (he was 2023’s biggest giver as well). Noteworthy grants included $1 billion to Bloomberg’s alma mater, Johns Hopkins University, to make medical school free for most students and increase financial aid for nursing and public-health students, plus $600 million to boost medical-school endowments at four historically Black colleges and universities. Earlier this year, Bloomberg Philanthropies also announced plans to support efforts to honor the country’s commitments under the Paris Agreement following the Trump administration’s withdrawal from the international agreement.
Key to the overarching strategy is using data to first identify problems, then target solutions and measure progress. Many of his philanthropic initiatives tend to focus on cities as key stakeholders, drawing on Bloomberg’s experience as mayor of New York City and working collaboratively with a network of mayors across the globe.
As Bloomberg noted in 2018: “Data doesn’t give us all the answers—that requires creativity and innovative problem-solving. But data and facts anchor our thinking to reality at a time when political debate is increasingly untethered to them.”