As [the students] prepared to collect their diplomas, their commencement speaker, Rob Hale, a billionaire philanthropist from Boston, returned to the dripping podium. He brought along two cash-stuffed duffel bags, he announced, and would hand every graduate $1,000 as they crossed the stage — $500 to keep for themselves, and $500 to give to any good cause.

[...]

It is the fourth Massachusetts college campus in the last four years where Mr. Hale has thrilled graduates with his signature split gift. Each time, he has selected a public school with high concentrations of first-generation and lower-income students who have “worked their tails off to get there,” he said.

Hale has no Wikipedia page.

top 13 comments

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[–] thebartermyth@hexbear.net 37 points 5 months ago

This supports my idea that every time a rich person gives me advice they should need to physically hand me cash for the entire time they're speaking.

[–] FourteenEyes@hexbear.net 34 points 5 months ago

$1000 isn't even that much anymore

[–] barrbaric@hexbear.net 27 points 5 months ago (2 children)

Yeah dude I'm giving it to the "fuck you I need rent" fund, a very noble charity indeed. Would you care to match my donation?

[–] 7bicycles@hexbear.net 21 points 5 months ago

Yeah real wdym donate to the poor, I am the poor hours

[–] kristina@hexbear.net 9 points 5 months ago

itd be great if that was tax deductible

[–] Llituro@hexbear.net 24 points 5 months ago

i guess he can be in a later group scheduled for the wall. not that first Bezos/Gates/Musk/Buffett lineup at least. this is at least not super annoying billionaire pr.

[–] PKMKII@hexbear.net 22 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Wikipedia says U Mass Dartmouth has around 6,800 undergraduates. Assume a relatively even distribution, that’s 1,700 seniors graduating. His net worth is $5.4 billion, which means he’d need to do this stunt ~32 times in order to have given away 1% of his net wealth.

[–] InevitableSwing@hexbear.net 14 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I hate the man but his $7m outlay (~$1.7m each for four unis) was money very well spent in a very clever PR move. Most people will see him as noble and good. Compare his one grand gifts to happy and stunned students to Bezo's moronic "Courage and Civility Award". The award was $100m but then it reduced to $50m. You don't need to be accountant or a math major to see that Bezo's could have kept 1,000s of people employed at the WaPo instead of giving Van Fucking Jones 100 million dollars.

Jones got that money in 2021. And - as far as I know - he's basically said nothing about it and done nothing with it.

[–] MaoTheLawn@hexbear.net 6 points 5 months ago

that name makes me want to vomit

[–] FlakesBongler@hexbear.net 21 points 5 months ago

Just getting big vibes of this

[–] Mokey@hexbear.net 17 points 5 months ago

Buy a gun and then a $500 bullet and donate it to his brain

[–] SorosFootSoldier@hexbear.net 16 points 5 months ago

Thanks for the money, dummy.

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 14 points 5 months ago

Look, if billionaires want to launder their bloodsoaked reputations I'd rather they do something useful like handing a bunch of college grads $1k in cash instead of laundering it into their own foundations to spend on eugenics experiments or whatever.