Hunts Point is a small town located on a small peninsula surrounded by Lake Washington. Less than 400 people live in this small town. Yet, the median household income is $250,001, and the median home value exceeds $2 million, making Hunts Point one of the wealthiest towns in the country.
One of the richest people in Hunts Point is Steve Ballmer. His net worth exceeds $92.7 billion, making him the 3rd richest person in Washington.
Who is Steve Ballmer?
Steve Ballmer is an American entrepreneur, investor, and former chief executive officer of Microsoft, the world's most recognized software maker.
He owns the Los Angeles Clippers and remains a shareholder in Microsoft, which makes the Windows operating system, Surface tablet computers, and the Xbox game console.
He met Bill Gates in College.
He was born on March 3, 1956, in Detroit, Michigan, and grew up in Farmington Hills, Michigan. Steve's father worked as a manager at Ford Motor Company but was able to send his son to Harvard.
He met Bill Gates at Harvard. They both lived down the hall from each other and shared a love of mathematics. Gates left school to find Microsoft in 1975, and Ballmer graduated with a math and economics degree in 1977 and joined Procter & Gamble as a product manager, sharing a cubicle with Jeffrey Immelt.
After working at Procter & Gamble, Steve Ballmer returned to study business at Stanford University. However, Bill Gates had a different plan for Ballmer. Gates wanted Ballmer to join him in building Microsoft, so in 1980, Ballmer became Microsoft's 30th employee. His connection to Bill Gates and his brilliance helped him climb the rank at Microsoft quickly, and in 2000, he was named chief executive officer after Bill Gates stepped down.
He helped Microsoft make more money and gain more customers.
Under his leadership, Microsoft's revenue continued to grow, but the company faced tough competition from Google and Apple. While Microsoft focused on computers, these two companies focused on research engines and mobile phones. So Ballmer acquired Skype in 2011 for $8.5 billion to fend off these two competitors and told Skype users, "Trust us. We're not going to screw up Skype." Three years later, Microsoft acquired Nokia for $7.2 billion.
In 2014, he stepped down as Microsoft CEO and became NBA basketball franchise owner when he bought L.A. Clippers for $2 billion, and the team value increased to $3.3 billion in the last eight years. According to Bloomberg, Ballmer still owns a 4% stake in Microsoft, making him one of the wealthiest people on this planet.
He wants to give every child a fighting chance.
Ballmer believes every child deserves an equal chance to achieve the American Dream, so he founded Ballmer Group with his wife, Connie, to improve economic mobility for children and families disproportionately likely to remain in poverty. He also leads USAFacts, an organization seeking to improve government spending transparency.
Steve Ballmer is a huge advocate for gun control.
Throughout the years, he funded Democrats and Republicans, but in generally modest amounts compared to his billionaire peers. However, in 2020, they donated $7 million to Every Town for Gun Safety, a gun-control group established by Mike Bloomberg that primarily supports Democratic nominees.
If you had Steve Ballmer's wealth, what would you do?
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