Long quote
It's true that all of those people did have a lot to give away, but if you had billions of dollars, would you want to part with it? Also, if I remember correctly, Bill Gates convinced dozens of the richest people in the world to give away half of their fortunes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Giving_Pledge
Would you give away half of your money? No, of course not. Not all of the 1% are greedy money hoarders. 50% is much more than anyone would agree to be taxed... And this was 50% of their total wealth.
In all honesty, it's hard for me to think in terms of having or giving away billions -- i never had that much money, and don't personally know anyone worth more than ~45 mil. What's more, i'm not even sure that i'm a nice guy -- certainly not an ideal for others to aspire to
So the answer is a definite "maybe."I'm betting that when you say "of course not," you're simply not scaling correctly. To put things into terms plebes like us could comprehend, imagine sitting at a diner with a crate of 100 toasted English muffins next to your cup of coffee when 50 starving people walk in. Would you give up half of those hot buttery English muffins to feed 50 total strangers? I would, though i like English muffins
If those English muffins were the only food I had, then no, I would probably not give away half of them. Maybe 25%, and even then that's a stretch if that was the food I had. Maybe they could have my coffee though, since I don't like coffee anyways.
But you don't have to think in terms of billions, millions, or muffins. Take whatever you have now, and imagine giving away half of it. Whether you have one thousand or one million dollars you can now only afford half of the things you could before. Your house can only be half as big, you can only buy half as much gas, half as much groceries, etc. You don't have to make up analogies because you can contribute the exact same amount as Gates: he didn't ask for 1 billion dollars, he asked for 50%. If you donate 50% of what you have right now, then you're equal to Gates in terms of charity.
Now, for you me and me, this is a big thing to do because I doubt either one of us could "afford" to give away our money. But much like Bill Gates isn't going to go hungry after donating, you and I wouldn't either. There are plenty of people who live on far less than you or I and make it along fine. Technically, we could survive, even if our lives are half as good. I think that it's still very generous of the people mentioned in that fund to give away half of their money, regardless of how much they have.