MacKenzie Scott Biography
MacKenzie Scott is an American novelist and philanthropist who was born on April 7, 1970, as Tuttle (previously Bezos). Her net worth as of December 2022 was US$27 billion, largely due to her 4% ownership in Amazon, the business her ex-husband Jeff Bezos created. Scott is therefore the 47th wealthiest person in the world and the third wealthiest woman in the United States. In 2020, Time listed Scott as one of the 100 most influential individuals, and in 2021 Forbes called her the most powerful woman in the world.
The Testing of Luther Albright, Scott’s 2005 debut novel, was the recipient of an American Book Award in 2006. Traps, her second book, was released in 2013. Since founding Bystander Revolution, an anti-bullying organization, in 2014, she has served as its executive director. Signatory to the Giving Pledge, she pledged to donate at least half of her money to charitable causes. In 2020, Scott gave US$5.8 billion to charitable causes, making it one of the biggest yearly gifts given by a private person to active nonprofits. In 2021, she gave an additional $2.7 billion. By mid-December 2022, Scott had donated $14 billion to more than 1600 nonprofits.
| WIKI FACTS & ABOUT DATA | |
|---|---|
| Full Name: | MacKenzie Scott Tuttle |
| Stage Name: | MacKenzie Scott |
| Born: | 7 April 1970 (age 53 years old) |
| Place of Birth: | San Francisco, California, United States |
| Nationality: | American |
| Education: | Princeton University |
| Height: | 1.70 m |
| Parents: | Jason Baker Tuttle, Holiday Robin |
| Siblings: | Jason Tuttle Jr., Chandler Tuttle |
| Spouse: | Dan Jewett (m. 2021–2023), Jeff Bezos (m. 1993–2019) |
| Boyfriend • Partner: | N/A |
| Children: | 4 |
| Occupation: | Philanthropist • Novelist |
| Net Worth: | $38.9 billion |
MacKenzie Scott Net Worth
MacKenzie Scott’s projected net worth as of September 2021 was $62 billion USD. It’s crucial to remember, though, that because she has a sizable share in Amazon, her net worth varies in tandem with shifts in the company’s stock price.
MacKenzie Scott Early life and education
On April 7, 1970, in San Francisco, California, MacKenzie Scott Tuttle was born into a family of housewife Holiday Robin (née Cuming) and financial planner Jason Baker Tuttle. Her brothers are two. G. Scott Cuming, an executive and general attorney for El Paso Natural Gas, is the grandfather of the woman by marriage. She first took writing seriously when she was six years old, and the 142-page book The Book Worm that she authored at the time was lost in a flood.
She received her diploma in 1988 from Lakeville, Connecticut’s Hotchkiss School. At Princeton University, where she studied under Nobel Laureate in Literature Toni Morrison, who called Tuttle “one of the best students I’ve ever had in my creative writing classes,” Tuttle received her bachelor’s degree in English in 1992.
MacKenzie Scott Career
Following her graduation from college, Tuttle assisted Morrison with research for his 1992 book Jazz. She also met Jeff Bezos while working in an administrative capacity for the New York City hedge fund D. E. Shaw.
Amazon
Following their marriage in 1993, Scott and Bezos went from D. E. Shaw to Seattle in 1994 to launch Amazon. Scott was among the original workers at Amazon and played a significant role in the company’s early development, helping with the name, business model, accounts, and early order shipping. She also arranged the first freight contract for the business. Scott stepped back from the industry after 1996 in order to concentrate on her family and writing career.
Literary career
Scott wrote The Testing of Luther Albright, her debut book, in 2005. In 2006, the book won an American Book Award. She claimed that while she was assisting Bezos in creating Amazon, giving birth to three children, and raising them, it took her ten years to write. Her old instructor Toni Morrison called the book “a rarity: a sophisticated novel that breaks and swells the heart” in her review. Traps, her second book, was released in 2013. NPD BookScan reports that her books sold poorly.
MacKenzie Scott Personal life
Scott and Jeff Bezos were wed. In 1992, she met him at D.E. Shaw where she was employed as an administrative assistant. Three months later, they were married and relocated from Manhattan to Seattle, Washington, in 1994. Three sons and a Chinese adoptive daughter make up their four children.
Scott received US$35.6 billion in Amazon shares as part of their community property divorce in 2019, but her ex-husband kept 75% of the couple’s Amazon stock. In April 2019, she surpassed all other female billionaires to become the third wealthiest woman in the world. Forbes assessed Scott’s net worth to be $36 billion in July 2020, making him the 22nd richest person in the world. Scott was crowned the richest woman in the world by September 2020, and by December 2020, her estimated net worth was $62 billion.
MacKenzie Bezos changed her name to MacKenzie Scott—a surname derived from her middle name—after divorcing Jeff Bezos.
Scott wed Dan Jewett, a science teacher at a high school in Seattle, in 2021. Jewett’s Giving Pledge letter, which was uploaded on March 6, 2021, disclosed the marriage. In September 2022, she filed for divorce from him, and in January 2023, the divorce was formalized.
MacKenzie Scott Philanthropy
Scott committed to donating the majority of her money to charity during her lifetime or in her will when she signed the Giving promise in May 2019. Despite its name, the promise is not enforceable.
Scott revealed that she had given $1.7 billion to 116 nonprofit groups, with an emphasis on racial equality, LGBTQ+ equality, democracy, and climate change, in a July 2020 Medium post. Her contributions to tribal colleges and universities, HBCUs, Hispanic-serving organizations, and other colleges total more than $800 million.
Less than six months later, in December 2020, Scott announced that she had given an additional $4.15 billion to 384 organizations in the preceding four months, with an emphasis on addressing long-term systemic injustices and helping those impacted by the financial effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. She stated that following July, as the US battled with the unprecedented effects of COVID-19 and billionaires’ wealth continued to rise, she wanted her advisory team to distribute her fortune more quickly.
The goal of her group was “identifying organizations with strong leadership teams and results, with special attention to those operating in communities facing high projected food insecurity, high measures of racial inequity, high local poverty rates, and low access to philanthropic capital”. Scott made one of the largest annual gifts by a single individual to active charities in 2020, totaling $5.8 billion.
Scott announced a further $2.7 billion in donations to 286 organizations on June 15, 2021. In a single year (July 2020 to July 2021), Scott reportedly gave $8.5 billion to 780 organizations, according to Forbes. The Equality Can’t Wait Challenge was established by Scott and Melinda French Gates in June 2021 with the goal of advancing gender equality. and increasing the status and influence of women in the US by 2030. Ten million dollars was given to each of the four winners, and two finalists shared an additional eight million dollars. Nine organizations announced gifts from Scott totaling $264.5 million in February 2022.
Additional donations, including $436 million to Habitat for Humanity and $275 million to Planned Parenthood, were revealed on March 23, 2022. The Big Brothers Big Sisters charity announced in May 2022 that Mackenzie Scott had donated $122.6 million. Additionally, Scott has donated to groups in Brazil, Micronesia, India, Kenya, and Latin America. According to a story published in April 2022 by The New York Times, Scott has donated more than $12 billion since 2019.
In September 2022, Scott gave the California Community Foundation (CCF), which awards grants to Los Angeles-based NGOs with a mission, two of her Beverly Hills residences, valued at a total of $55 million. The organization plans to sell both houses, donating 90% of the proceeds to programs that support affordable housing and the remaining 10% to an immigrant integration program.
Scott made the largest individual donation in the history of Girl Scouts of the USA, giving $84.5 million to the organization and its 29 local councils in October 2022. Scott had given about $14 billion to 1500 organizations as of November 2022. Scott made a “open call” in March 2023 for community-focused charity organizations that he may provide funding to. Scott intends to donate $1 million in an unrestricted manner to 250 charities that were chosen during the process.
These unrequested, unrestricted payments have largely benefited organizations advocating for fundamental reforms in the country’s early childhood development system. Major gifts to the Early Childhood Funders Collaborative ($3 million to be regranted to organizations advocating for child care reform), Parents as Teachers ($7 million to expand voluntary home visiting), the Ericson Institute ($8 million to advance advocacy training for early childhood policy leaders), and the Alliance for Early Success ($10 million to advance coalition-building in state-level early childhood policy advocacy) were reported in the Chronicle of Philanthropy.
There is a blatant racial justice component to several of these presents. A new “Power Equity Initiative,” for instance, will be funded by the Alliance for Early Success funding and will concentrate on strengthening the influence of underrepresented groups in the advocacy of early childhood policies.
According to Forbes, “the unrestricted and ultimately more trusting nature of Scott’s philanthropy is the exception, not the norm in their world.” The Times reported that “Ms. Scott has turned traditional philanthropy on its head… by disbursing her money quickly and without much hoopla, Ms. Scott has pushed the focus away from the giver, and onto the nonprofits, she is trying to help.” “Teams with experience on the front lines of challenges will know best how to put the money to good use,” Scott said in her statement.
Slightly over half of the 277 nonprofit organizations polled for this report by the Center for Effective Philanthropy said that their grant from Scott has made fundraising easier. Some even said they can use it as leverage with other donors, and the size of the gift “has enabled organizations to focus funds where they were most needed to achieve their mission.” Scott encountered criticism in December 2021 after stating in a Medium article that she would not disclose the amount of money she had donated or the recipients of it. She then said that her group would create a website where information about her charitable endeavors would be shared. She shared a link to her donation database in December of 2022.
Yield Giving
Scott uploaded a database containing her gifts to the Yield Giving website in December 2022. According to its website, “Yield is named after a belief in adding value by giving up control.” Yield Giving has “yielded” more than $14 billion to more than 1,600 non-profit organizations as of June 2023.
About MacKenzie Scott
MacKenzie Scott is an author, philanthropist, and the former spouse of Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, with whom she had 25 years of marriage. She was awarded a 4% share in the online business as part of their 2019 divorce.
She signed the Giving Pledge in May 2019, just after she revealed the details of the divorce on Twitter, pledging to donate at least half of her money to charitable causes over her lifetime.
Scott provides information about the $14.4 billion she has donated to almost 1,600 nonprofit organizations since 2020 on a website named Yield Giving.
With her “no strings attached” giving approach, Scott gives the nonprofits she donations complete discretion over how to use the additional monies.
Two-time novelist Scott was a research assistant for novelist Toni Morrison while she was a Princeton student.
MacKenzie Scott Achievements
Throughout her career, MacKenzie Scott has won various accolades. Here are a few of her noteworthy honors and accomplishments:
She was the 2006 American Book Award winner for The Testing of Luther Albright, her debut book.
Forbes listed her as one of the world’s 50 most powerful women in 2013.
The University of California, Berkeley granted her an honorary doctorate in humane letters in 2014.
Scott finished her secondary school at Hotchkiss School, where she was awarded the Distinguished Alumna Award in 2015.
In 2019, Scott made a commitment to donate the majority of her wealth to charitable organizations while she was still alive by signing the Giving Pledge.
She gave $1.7 billion to 116 organizations in 2020 that addressed issues like public health, gender equity, racial justice, and climate change.
She was included in the Time 100 list of the most important people in the world in 2021.
Scott is well known for her charitable endeavors, and her contributions have helped a large number of nonprofit groups that tackle some of the most important problems facing the globe.
MacKenzie Scott Social Media
- Instagram handle: Mackenzie Scott (@kenziee.scott)
- Twitter handle: MacKenzie Scott (@mackenziescott)
https://www.tiktok.com/@mackenzie_scott_help
What did MacKenzie Scott do before marrying Jeff Bezos?
Profession. Following her graduation from college, Tuttle assisted Morrison with research for his 1992 book Jazz. She also met Jeff Bezos while working in an administrative capacity for the New York City hedge fund D. E. Shaw.
Does MacKenzie Scott have a degree?
On April 7, 1970, MacKenzie Scott was born in San Francisco, California. After attending the Connecticut-based Hotchkiss School, she proceeded to Princeton University, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in English in 1992.
How much money has MacKenzie Scott given away?
The gifts, which range in value from $1 million to $15 million, total $97 million. Almost all of the proceeds were donated to organizations that support early childhood development and education. Since 2020, Scott has donated more than $14.1 billion to at least 1,621 charitable organizations.
Does MacKenzie Scott still get money from Amazon?
In2019, Scott and Jeff Bezos, the founder and executive chairman of Amazon, got divorced. As part of the settlement, Scott got a 4% ownership stake in Amazon. She promised to donate her “disproportionate amount of money” and to “keep at it until the safe is empty” in that same year.
Who has MacKenzie Scott donated money to?
Since mid-2020, she has contributed to over 1,200 organizations; her three biggest one-time gifts are to Habitat for Humanity ($436 million), the Boys and Girls Club of America ($281 million), and Planned Parenthood ($275 million).
Why is MacKenzie Scott the most powerful?
Not only has Scott started to fulfill her promise, but she’s doing so at a record-breaking rate and with complete discretion over her financial decisions: Scott, who is worth $57 billion, has donated $8.6 billion to 780 organizations that support public health, racial justice, gender parity, and other causes in just over two years.