EY Y03 L23 Billionaires

  1. Who is the wealthiest person you know? How did they make their money? Are they generous with their wealth?
  2. There are currently around 2,700 billionaires worldwide. Name one who has been in the news recently. How old are they? Which country are they from? How did they become so wealthy?
  3. Why were they in the news?
  4. If you were a billionaire, what do you imagine your life would be like? Where would you live? How would you spend your time? What would you do with your money?
  5. If you were a billionaire, how could you use your money to make your city, country or even the whole world a better place?
  6. Do you think that people with billions of dollars have an obligation to help those less fortunate than themselves, to help better the planet for everyone? Or do you think that billionaires have the right to spend their money as they see fit?

Question 1

The wealthiest person I know is one of my clients from my previous job whom I had a very good professional relationship with him. He is the owner of a big air conditioning company. He is very generous with his wealth when giving rewards or bonuses to his employees.

Question 2

One of them is Mark Zuckerberg. He's 37 years old and from America. As everyone knows, he became rich by founding Facebook.

Question 3

He was in the news recently because Facebook, Instagram, and Whatsapp was down for several hours on Oct 5. It was suspected to be some sort of problem with their servers.

Question 4

I would make sure that I had enough money to ensure my business remains successful and my employees are paid well. I would use my money to buy comfortable but not overly ostentatious houses in some places that I really love and travel all over the world. I would also give money to my parents and family members that I really liked. I would also spoil my closest friends with gifts or treating them out to meals and travels with me. I would also spend my money improving my health and learning new things. The rest of my money I will definitely give back to charities involved with education, food, and science.

Question 5

I would use my money for education. I believe that many under developed countries, like the Philippines, stay that way because quality education is only available so such a small amount of people. I understand the privileges I enjoyed by being able to go to the best schools there, but I believe that everyone should have the same experience.

Question 6

I think billionaires should ensure they have enough money to run and grow their businesses and increase their own quality of life, but I also think that they should give all their excess money back to the community. Currently, they have no obligation to do so but would just make the world a much better place if everyone agreed on an acceptable percentage of their profits to go back to helping communities via taxes or charities and that the money is being properly used.

Tough Vocabulary