| In earlier times 12:43 - Apr 11 with 748 views | factual_blue |
A British billionaire donated (not sold) over 5,000 expensive pieces of medical equipment to the country. One for every hospital. Each machine (an iron lung, keeping polio sufferers alive) cost around £70,000 in today's prices. So that's the equivalent of £350m.
This was Lord Nuffield, and it's estimated his charitable donations amounted to over £11bn during his lifetime.
james dyson and aaron banks are, as Private Eye would say, 94.
Update
Ventilators cost around $25,000 each.
Why aren't our modern-day billionaires stepping up to the plate like Lord Nuffield? [Post edited 11 Apr 2020 13:14]
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| In earlier times on 14:22 - Apr 11 with 664 views | BlueBadger |
They're just getting round to it, as soon as they can work out how to use it to offset tax. |  |
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| In earlier times on 14:43 - Apr 11 with 625 views | Darth_Koont |
I took the Dyson stuff as pure self-promotion as soon as they said they were coming up with a design from scratch. Rather than manufacturing existing, proven designs that people have also been trained on.
It was Musk and his "Tor-paedo" all over again. |  |
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| In earlier times on 14:44 - Apr 11 with 623 views | ElephantintheRoom |
Except that he profiteered in a different era before there was such a thing as the welfare state and much interest in the great unwashed.
It could be argued that his donations to oxford university have greatly increased ineaquality in this country and by partronising inbreds running this country destroyed what was achieved in the post war years |  |
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| In earlier times on 14:52 - Apr 11 with 599 views | Darth_Koont |
| In earlier times on 14:44 - Apr 11 by ElephantintheRoom |
Except that he profiteered in a different era before there was such a thing as the welfare state and much interest in the great unwashed.
It could be argued that his donations to oxford university have greatly increased ineaquality in this country and by partronising inbreds running this country destroyed what was achieved in the post war years |
There was also much interest in the "great unwashed" after the war with an electorate, politicians and media that were on the whole committed to social, health, housing and education reform.
We dropped the ball over recent decades by making a religion out of individual liberty ((basically ignoring the accompanying risks of low tax and low social responsibility). Now we're at least fumbling to pick the ball up. | |
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| In earlier times on 17:05 - Apr 11 with 502 views | Ewan_Oozami |
| In earlier times on 14:44 - Apr 11 by ElephantintheRoom |
Except that he profiteered in a different era before there was such a thing as the welfare state and much interest in the great unwashed.
It could be argued that his donations to oxford university have greatly increased ineaquality in this country and by partronising inbreds running this country destroyed what was achieved in the post war years |
He was one of the great unwashed himself originally as I understand it... |  |
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| In earlier times on 17:13 - Apr 11 with 490 views | WD19 |
A personal fortune of £11bn. I am not sure how this can be. Every poster worth his salt knows inequality was only invented in the 1980’s and barely became a ‘thing’ at all until the last few years. |  | | |
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