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Mid-day Update

PODCAST: Peter and Jennifer Buffett on giving without being self-serving

David Brancaccio Dec 11, 2013
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Mid-day Update

PODCAST: Peter and Jennifer Buffett on giving without being self-serving

David Brancaccio Dec 11, 2013
HTML EMBED:
COPY

One of the details in yesterday’s budget deal concerns an agency that many Americans have probably never heard of.  But about 44 million people’s retirements could depend on the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation — PBGC for short — and the agency has run deficits for years.

One of the world’s largest hotel chains expects investors will check in and stay awhile. Hilton Worldwide will price shares of the company after the market closes today, and will begin trading Thursday.

“There’s this industry, essentially, around very real issues done in a way that has an element of a self-serving quality — and it’s certainly a self-perpetuating quality,” says Peter Buffett, speaking of the world of charitable giving. About seven years ago, Peter, a composer and musician, and his wife Jennifer were thrust into the world of high profile philanthropy when Warren Buffett poured about a billion dollars into the NoVo Foundation. NoVo works to empower girls and women globally and to foster locally-focused economies. But along the way, Peter and Jennifer have learned a number of lessons about what works and what doesn’t when it comes to trying to use your money to fix a major problem, and even become critics of the way many philanthropies work.

 

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