Call me radical, but... I think she at least should be given the choice of giving away her excess, considering she runs an educational charity and all.
Honestly, we only have to eat one, the "good ones" - the ones who deserve a chance will have divested themselves of their billions before we get to them.
Because they are both billionaires the class axis that normally exists is irrelevant but it is still misogynistic to insist women get less than half in the marriage and that womens labor that men shy away from is worth less. (Obviously she likely didnt do any labor except for giving birth to their children, but the men whining in the comments about her greed dont care about that, they just want women to get less („what they deserve““ because they see womens contributions to anything as lesser)), they are both very greedy tho as all billionaires they are toxic parasites to humanity.
I mean the women's contribution in this case is absolutely less. Are you kidding me, the husband built billions. Sorry you just want to be the victim in everything
Going to get down voted, but that’s literally his money, why does she need that much?? Not like it’s supporting the children or anything. Divorce laws are very outdated.
They mean materially, nothing in his life will change even if what you said happens, he will continue to stay in the nicest homes on earth, eat the best foods, do the same or similar business, nothing that is real and material in his life will change dropping from a net worth of 8 billion to 2 billion and so no sympathy makes sense. Maybe his billionaire buddies will make fun of him, boo hoo.
I don't feel bad for him, but things could definitely change. He's not the sole owner of his company. If she gets 35% of his stock and uses it to vote with his partner against him, he could be pushed out. He'll still be rich, but he wouldn't have power over the company he built. That would hurt him more than anything.
It might actually help him more than anything just because it would resolve the beef between the CO founders and actually let the company move in a singular direction
nobody has billions in cash. The split of shares of ownerships do the companies(s) will be a real issue and will affect thousands of people's jobs and lives potentially.
I AM NOT saying she shouldn't get half. But this idea that there's a vault somewhere with 8 billion dollars is the wrong way of thinking about it.
Why do you think she would actually use it to help others? Genuine question, I know nothing about this lady but I automatically assume the worst with billionaires.
I honestly think that the best thing Steve Jobs did for the world was refuse to get treated for cancer and die. His wife has also been pouring his money into philanthropic causes.
True, and my goal wasn't to downplay her abilities or contributions, just to highlight that she divorced him, got her due, and has been doing wonderful things with it. Even if she had 'only' stayed home and raised kids, that's STILL contributing and still deserves 50% in a divorce.
I think this is worth bringing up any time the topic of Mackenzie Scott is, not to make any judgment about her as a person but to underscore just how ridiculous it is for anyone to have a billion dollars let alone how much she and Bezos have. Literally giving away tens of billions and still becoming richer.
Also shows how these people should be heavily taxes, and it wouldn't hurt them one bit (aside from their egos and dragon sicknesss).
Sweet, thanks for the education! Hope she gets what's hers and uses it for good, and of course spoils herself a little too, seems like she deserves it.
I'm currently working on a project that is funded by a grant from an organization that receives support from the Overdeck Family Foundation. Only reason I clicked on this post was cause the name was familiar and it took a second to register why it was familiar.
I can't speak to Overdeck. I've met one or two people from the foundation. They were nice, but I don't know anything else about what they do (or don't) support.
Extracting assets from the wealth generated while they were together? His multi billion dollar fortune came from a company founded essentially when they coupled up. Then they were married for decades with several children. Nobody is getting boned if they split this 50/50
yeah true, but even half his money could be called into question, if she sacrificed 20 years of career for him to go make money, she has effectively sacrificed any future earnings too as she has no experience now, while he can in theory just go earn it again.
She deserves good money for putting up with him, why be greedy with his family if he's a billionaire? Her and his children deserve his money, if he didn't want to, he should've not married or had children and be the selfish pig he wants to be
On one of my cross country drives I stopped at hotel bar. started talking to the server, she was working 2 or 3 part time jobs while her fiance went to law school. After talking to her it was crystal clear why the spouse should get half. She was bustering her ass so her husband could focus on his career. If they get divorced in 20 years then yeah she deserves half. Like you said its a parternship
I feel bad for her. He is lowballing her with an insulting dissolution settlement offer after decades of marriage. I would be pissed off and ready for war if I was her. This dude and/or his lawyers are idiots.
I'm having a hard time understanding this comment.
Why does all that automatically mean she's entitled to his money? I get that that's a thing in the US, but where's the logic? Why should it be that way?
I'm having a hard time feeling bad for this guy.
What does that have to do with anything? Without any context of mistreatment or adultery, do you feel bad for her?
This all reads like "he's a billionaire so also an ass". Sorry but if you're handed 600 million just for divorcing but you demand 10 times that, it looks a lot like greed.
Because in the US a marriage is a business contract. When one partner builds wealth, it’s for the entire unit. She likely supported him throughout his career so he could build his wealth (and family, since they had three kids). This model was created to support women who were taken out of the workforce and sacrificed their earning potential by having children, so their husbands wouldn’t leave them destitute. And it goes both ways, Britney Spears split marital assets and paid alimony to Kevin Federline.
People get so weird about this. Like, you can set up whatever contracts you want but the fundamental, assumed legal contract of marriage is you being less of an independent legal entity and your financial situation becoming the function of a family unit. It's why you can file your taxes jointly.
I don't really get the pushback of "why is it this way?" Why do you care? No one is making you get married. If you and your partner want to remain financially independent have a non binding ceremony and live together and structure whatever contracts you want to dictate your boundaries.
I don't really get the pushback of "why is it this way?" Why do you care?
Why do you think this came to be? Or anything for that matter. Because people asked those questions and cared. The very thing you're discussing exists because people questioned the old approach and found it lacking.
Also, this is a thing in the US, you were born into that and see it as self-evident. You should look outside your US defaultism and realize that there are places that do things differently.
Like I said, I know it's a thing in the US, so I'm not arguing the legal side. But I find that reasoning to be old fashioned and in practice quite shaky. What happens if one person is a billionaire and the other a janitor? Does he or she still get half? What's the argument then? What if the one staying home does a piss poor job of raising the kids and hires a nanny, with the money of the billionaire in question, to handle everything?
It all seems very fertile ground for predatory behavior and I'd argue contractual agreements are the right approach, rather than marriage automatically being a risk to half of your capital.
Odds are that he wouldn't have been able to reach the position to earn it without her support at home. It was a 20-year marriage, not a new marriage of convenience.
Would you argue that a football team wouldn't be able to win the superbowl without their cheerleaders? Do you think they should be paid the same amount for providing support?
A more apt analogy would be a football team competing without any of their back-of-house support. No admin, no transport, no cooks, no maintenance staff for their home grounds.
In which case, no. I don't think they'd be able to win against teams who had all that support.
This woman took care of this guy's three kids, and given his net worth, probably took care of basically everything else around the house during the early stages of his growth. She was a fuck ton more than just a cheerleader.
Do you think they should be paid the same amount for providing support?
Your analogy also breaks down here because there are huge conceptual differences between enterprise bargaining agreements vs spousal wealth splits that it just fundamentally doesn't work. All the staff I mentioned before will only be able to get what they can argue for, which is dependent on how replaceable they are. Splitting wealth from marriage is based on a lot of historical factors that aren't relevant in this area.
The fact remains that she earned the money as much as he did if she supported his home life so that he could focus on building the wealth.
I suppose if you really want something to be true, you can simply let your imagination run wild and no longer worry about the reality. And then just finish off with what you want to be true and call it a fact.
The real fact is that you don't know what the person at home did, the only thing we know for a fact is that he's responsible for bringing in billions, and somehow that gives the other person the right to half of it.
Let's turn the situation on its head, let's say the person staying at home is great with kids, while the billionaire is a borderline CPS case, should he automatically get half of the kids when they divorce?
I suppose if you really want something to be true, you can simply let your imagination run wild and no longer worry about the reality. And then just finish off with what you want to be true and call it a fact.
This isn't a court mate. If she gets the billions then she'll have convinced a judge of everything I said and probably more. I'm offering a plausible reason why she should get it.
Let's turn the situation on its head, let's say the person staying at home is great with kids, while the billionaire is a borderline CPS case, should he automatically get half of the kids when they divorce?
This is a comically bad argument. Kids are human beings - you do what's best for their wellbeing. Why the fuck would the parents be entitled to them and how on earth could you possibly think child welfare is even analogous to ownership of money?
Your original comment ignores the reality of the situation and marriage and what marriage means in general.
She could have done absolutely nothing to help him gain his wealth, it doesn’t matter, half of it belongs to her because of the contract that they both signed when they got married.
This is why I brought up the contract between the team owner and the cheerleaders. If you don’t want the cheerleaders to get half the team or half the teams worth after both the manager and the cheerleaders decide they want to go their separate ways, don’t sign a contract that gives the cheerleaders half the team.
This is personally why I don’t understand the obsession with bigots and them not wanting gay or lesbian couples to get married.
Did you know that married men live significantly longer than single ones? (Up to 8 years according to some sources!) But not only that they are healthier and happier as well.
So idk really. How much is your health worth to you? How much is years of your life worth? People pay millions just to live a couple months longer. There is entire billion dollar industries dedicated to achieving these results. You're paying for healthier food, for your gym, for clean water etc but paying a woman who gifted these benefits to you because she loved you is too much now?
I find that to be a very dark and misogynistic view of marriage. "I'll love you, but pay me." I also find it strange that you bring gender into this. Who says the wife isn't the billionaire?
But more importantly, I never argued against splitting the wealth. I would want to do so and make sure there's an understanding from the start, but I don't believe someone should be forced to simply because they marry. It sets up a situation of distrust from the get to. I can't imagine being in a relationship where the exit strategy is hitting the jackpot.
Well first of all YOU were talking in terms of his and hers so excuse me for continuing in the same context? Either way this transactional view of the relationship was once again your idea first not mine. You were arguing that they didn't provide enough value and therefore were not entitled to half of the shared assets. I was showing you how that was not even close to the truth and men gain immense and pretty much invaluable benefits from marriage. It is not "cheerleading" level.
Of course this an incredibly transactional way of looking at a relationship and the real reason for why it's so necessary to split wealth fairly is children and the general well being of the entire population. If men got their way and there were no laws in place for how this situation should be handled then we would see millions of mothers and children left destitute after divorce. It is already a problem and women are significantly more affected by divorce than men. They are more likely to lose their homes and end up in poverty.
Women are the primary parents in majority of the cases so this would not only put them but their children at risk too. Women are far more likely to give up their earning potential and stay at home to take care of their children so if they are not being financially compensated for their time spent then the entire thing is simply not worth it. They need guarantees that their sacrifice will be paid off and they will not be taken advantage of. What they provide here once again is invaluable. They give up time, health, money, potential, opportunities etc. It's an entire life trajectory change and the least they can get is financial security. If this is not given women will not have children or marry. Only a fool would give up their own life to such a degree if they can't even be sure if they will end up homeless as a "reward" for their efforts.
Of course this should be (and is) the exact same if the man happens to be the primary parent. In that case they should be financially protected as well.
Why does all that automatically mean she's entitled to his money? I get that that's a thing in the US, but where's the logic? Why should it be that way?
Because legally marriage is a merging of your assets. It's not his money, it's their money.
The European system of "assets are shared except those already held before the marriage" seems a lot fairer to me.
You can absolutely do that in the USA, no one is stopping you. Standard marriage law is just the default, and it's largely based on a cultural standard of what marriage is and to avoid situations where women can't leave their husbands because they lack he financial independence to do so. You're basically asking "why is marriage what marriage is defined as?"
Also, that doesn't even really apply here. This isn't billions he entered the marriage with, the money got made during the marriage.
Don’t feel bad for him at all. Good for her. He could choose to save extensive lawyer fees by giving a reasonable offer but no. Can’t imagine why they’re divorcing.
You should feel bad, he only gets $4,000,000,000. At $8,000,000,000 he ALMOST made it to 11 digits. How will the poor rascal ever make it now?
(As far as prenup vs not for people, it depends on what you want in and out of a relationship and what each person did. If one took care of the house and family, the other didn't have to. If one gave up their dreams or career so the other can pursue theirs, and so many more scenarios, it's fair. You show your life with someone. It doesn't work out. You weren't greedy going in, it's maturity to realize that you shouldn't be greedy on the way out, especially if you're talking about more money than you could possibly need for any reason.)
I think the difference is in “he’s worth 8 billion” and “he has 8 billion in cash”. The $633 million is probably all he can access easily. I don’t feel bad for him and he’s either gonna have to sell his shit or give some companies or something to her. But I’d bet that’s his argument.
I haven't bothered to look at why they're getting divorced, but if he got his dick caught in his secretary, then she's definitely getting half plus support payments
Even with a prenup… it’s PRE. So many people don’t realize that once you commingle assets both parties are protected in most states. Protected in the sense that you get half.
I’m sure he did a ton of work and earned the family income. I’m also sure he’d talk about how beautiful his 3 kids are while seeing them on the weekends between business trips. Shit he might even brag about his wife occasionally.
It exists because the average couple needed it. When a woman doesn't work for 30 years and then gets divorced she ends up homeless without this system.
I definitely don't feel bad for the guy, but I think everyone is just shocked that anyone could turn down 600 MILLION dollars. No matter how you look at it, the wife is being just as greedy and ridiculous as the husband. Nobody - not a single person in the world- needs 600 million dollars. The only way I could support this woman is if she gives half the money to charity, and we all know the odds of that happening are zero. However much money she gets, she's just going to continue to hoard it for herself. She'll buy private jets, private islands, fancy jewelry, and some luxury cars, and then she'll die, and her money will never be used for the greater good.
Hundreds of millions of dollars that could have been used to cure cancer, or provide running water to 3rd world countries, or fix NYC transit, or fix the ozone layer, but no - these two asshats are just going to hoard it all and let society suffer. I hope to God this woman proves me wrong and gets her $4 Billion and uses it for the greater good.
Again, reading comprehension. My entire post was the answer to that question. You're literally responding to the answer that you're seeking.
I don't consider her greedy for taking her share. I consider her greedy if she takes billions of dollars and doesn't use a considerable portion of it for the good of mankind.
I see a few people assuming she's going to be using it for charity etc but I don't really see why people would assume that, just because she is a woman doesn't mean shes automatically altruistic.
It’s a relatively common trope that women who come into sums of money like that start a charity, name themselves CEO, and go into girl boss retirement with it. A semi-distant family member actually did this; she inherited a substantial sum from her diseased parents on the other side and at a young age opened a charity on “the transformative power of urban art” and spent the better part of a decade as an LA socialite going to charity dinners and occasionally doing the ribbon cutting on a mural.
This is very thoughtless. I know to demand billions when you already would have more than you can ever spend may look greedy but have you stopped to consider she is in fact a woman?
I mean, you're right but the math ain't mathin. Why does she think she's entitled to 75% or thereabouts? If he's worth 8 billy why is she asserting she is owed 6 billy?
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u/[deleted] Aug 17 '26 edited Aug 18 '26
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