Through the wizardry of charitable giving, J.K. Rowling has done a disappearing act from the billionaires’ club.
The “Harry Potter” writer has dropped off Forbes magazine's latest list of the world’s billionaires -- in part because she gave away a lot of her fortune to charity.
New information about Rowlings' estimated $160 million in charitable giving combined with Britain's high tax rates bumped the Harry Potter scribe from our list this year.
Rowling, a former jobless single mom, rode the worldwide success of the “Harry Potter” fantasy series to become the world’s first billionaire novelist on Forbes’ list last year. She has been involved in a number of charities.
Rowling founded Lumos, a U.K.-based charity that helps disadvantaged children, and is president of Gingerbread, a charity that supports single parents. She also founded the Volant Charitable Trust, a Scotland-based charity that supports research into multiple sclerosis and other charitable causes.
“You have a moral responsibility when you’ve been given far more than you need, to do wise things with it and give intelligently," Rowling has been quoted as saying.
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