If Gates doesn't work for you try Warren Buffet
“A meaningful estate tax is needed to prevent our democracy from becoming a dynastic plutocracy.â€
Is Buffet also "clueless on economics"?
So, there are two of the wealthiest people on the planet seeing the need to "give back".
the wealthy pay many other taxes, and for that matter, pay them far in excess of the cost of every possible government service they have ever received
I pay $300/mo in property taxes. Most of that goes toward education. I don't have kids but I can still understand how those taxes benefit my community and myself.
At some point, people need to decide whether what we earn belongs to us, or to the State. And if the latter, then we belong to the State, too. Is that what this country was supposed to be?
You talk about the "State" as though it were Communist Russia where 250,000 people controlled the lives and enjoyed the fruits of labor from 250million "comrades". I always thought the State, or our Government, was "us"- we are the State. Probably a naive view but I think that's what this country was supposed to be.