60 Minutes - 3/27/2016: Make-A-Wish, The Health Wagon, The Giving Pledge

Episode Date: March 28, 2016

Bill Whitaker meets some of the people behind the popular organization that grants the wishes of seriously ill children; Then, Scott Pelley meets nurse practitioners who are providing badly needed health care to the uninsured, working poor in Appalachia; and, Charlie Rose reports on new club for billionaires. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Kaden Erickson is fighting a deadly type of leukemia. My number one wish choice is to go to Australia. Months after his interview, Kaden thought he was getting this plaque just for being a Make-A-Wish volunteer. Make-A-Wish October 11, 2014. Kaden Erickson, your wish has... Your wish has been granted. Hey, Kayden, you're going to Australia. There's been a lot of debate about Obamacare and whether it's possible for the government to cover every American. Nearly 13 million have signed up for it so far, but we found many may never get on board.

Y'all come on in out of the rain. Hello, Mr. Hank. How are you doing? For a fortunate few, there is the health wagon. Hold your breath for me. Who are these people who come into the van? For a fortunate few, there is the health wagon. Who are these people who come into the van? They are people that are in desperate need. They have no insurance, and they usually wait, we say, until they are train wrecks. Billionaires don't usually like to talk about their wealth, but this group has. They and others like them have

all pledged to give at least half of their incredible fortunes away to charity, a half a trillion dollars so far. The government is showing, you know, over the past couple decades that it can no longer solve the great problems of the day. Now these philanthropists, who have incredible wealth, and also the name and the influence, are uniquely qualified right now to solve the huge problems. I'm Steve Croft. I'm Leslie Stahl. I'm Bill Whitaker. I'm Charlie Rose. I'm Scott Pelley. Those stories tonight on this special edition of 60 Minutes. There are very few things that you can be certain of in life.

But you can always be sure the sun will rise each morning. You can bet your bottom dollar that you'll always need air to breathe and water to drink. And, of course, you can rest assured that with Public Mobile's 5G subscription phone plans, you'll pay the same thing every month. With all of the mysteries that life has to offer, a few certainties can really go a long way. Subscribe today for the peace of mind you've been searching for. Public Mobile. Different is calling. Why do fintechs like Float choose Visa? As a more trusted, more secure payments network, Visa provides scale expertise and innovative payment solutions. Learn more at visa.ca slash fintech. On this Easter night, we celebrate people who are making a difference.

Hometown volunteers helping sick children's dreams come true. Health workers bringing care to forgotten pockets of poverty. Billionaires sharing their wealth. We begin with Make-A-Wish. If you could be anything, go anywhere, or meet anyone, what would you wish for? The Make-A-Wish Foundation has been asking seriously ill children that question for 35 years. Make-A-Wish became famous by making dying children's final wishes come true. A child doesn't have to be terminally ill anymore to get a wish. Last year, the organization granted almost 15,000 wishes. They cover a broad range. Some children get to meet famous athletes. One had much of San Francisco pretend he was Batman for a day. Another chose to jump from an airplane. We wanted to find out what leads to

these wondrous moments. Make-A-Wish is a growing organization that spent more than 200 million donated dollars on wishes in 2014. It's headquartered in Phoenix, has more than 60 local chapters across the country, and almost 40 more around the world. To see how wishes become reality, we spent time with some of its most dedicated volunteers in one of its most active chapters in the northeast corner of Arkansas. As we reported back in October, we discovered a place where, despite persistent poverty, we found inspiring generosity.

Thank you. You're fine. Thank you. I don't care. You're fine. Appreciate you so much. They begin at dawn. One day a year, hundreds of volunteers fan out across northeast Arkansas to raise money at street corners. Good morning, men. Thank you all. In schools.

Their goal? Thank you so much. In schools, their goal? To get enough money on this one day to grant every wish for the area's sickest children. Volunteers Christy Matthews and Dana Johnson have run this fundraiser every year since 1999. I mean, it literally just exploded. Every year we would add another town. This is small town America. They're very small towns, 600 literally just exploded. Every year we would add another town. This is small-town America? They're very small towns, 600, 700 people. A handful will change at a time.

As this day's donation deadline approaches, groups of volunteers race to the local radio station to announce their town's total, down to the penny. Give me a number. $8,468.62. $25,301. $12,054.55. And the big finish is just moments away. Stand by. The total tally from Northeast Arkansas is the big story

on the 7 o'clock news. What do we have here? 323,000. That's 323,000, enough to grant more than 30 wishes donated from places with little to spare. In Harrisburg, 40% live in poverty. But this town of 2,000 still contributed $25,000. The wishes were going just to children who were dying. And that's no longer the case? You know, we talk about it not being a last wish, but we create lasting wishes and memories that these families can take on forever. Hi, Caden.

Caden Erickson is fighting a deadly type of leukemia. At his interview as a potential recipient, he thought his wish was a long shot. My number one wish choice is to go to Australia. Awesome. Folks here make granting the wish a big surprise. Months after his interview, Caden thought he was getting this plaque just for being a Make-A-Wish volunteer. Make-A-Wish October 11, 2014. Caden Erickson, your wish has... Your wish has been granted.

Hi, Clayton. You're going to Australia. His mother, Jeannie. He was just shaking the plaque, and his little legs were just doing a little happy dance in the chair, and it was something pretty special. You must have been surprised. I was the most surprised I've ever been in my life. I'm so excited for you, you know it?

Kendra Street choreographed Caden's surprise. When not playing fairy godmother, she's teaching at Marmaduke Elementary School. Everyone at the school chipped in to pay for Caden's wish. Many turned out to share the revelation. I get to go he was grateful, and he knew what it meant for him and his family. Thank you, everybody. Caden had endured two excruciating bone marrow transplants. When he, his parents, and four siblings hit the beach in Australia, they hoped he'd beaten the cancer. The highlight of his trip? Got to hold a koala.

Did he like put his arms around you? It was like a hug. It was about as heavy as a baby and it would put the claws here and the claws here and so it was like you were getting hugged by a koala. You kind of get attached to the koalas. Did it make you forget for a while that you were sick? Yes, it made me feel a little bit normal, more normal than I've been for a while. Feeling normal didn't last long. Shortly after returning home,

Caden learned his cancer had returned for the third time. As we settled in for our interview, his mom, Jeannie, adjusted the medication he needs. It's pumped into his body next to his heart. You're in quite a struggle with this disease. There are some bad things in my body that are kind of stubborn. I think you're kind of stubborn yourself. Thank you, I think. Caden is so stubborn that after deliberating for a week, he decided to undergo a third agonizing bone marrow transplant.

The previous two were so difficult, his parents didn't want to force him to go through it again. How did you make that decision? Would I rather just die or would I have a chance of living? It was a tough decision to make. Because the therapy makes you feel bad? It can make me feel bad. It can hurt me. It could do more harm than help. So I'm just hoping this time they will get rid of it for good. Caden's wish granter, Kendra Street, was devastated when she learned his cancer had come

back. You have an attachment with your kids, and Caden's one that I've really attached to, and I've gotten to keep in touch with him. And so seeing him have to go through that again, it's just painful. He's just a really amazing kid. You see, Kendra had survived her own fight with cancer. Back when she was in high school, she had her wish granted. The Make-A-Wish Foundation is sending you to the Atlanta Braves. Getting to meet the Atlanta Braves was thrilling, she says, but... Not to underestimate what my wish was for me, but if I had to sacrifice having my wish to be able to give it to someone else,

I would definitely be willing to give it to someone else. Being the grantor of the wish. Yes. Is the better end of the deal. Absolutely. You get to give that joy. You get to pass it on to someone else. The same chapter passed it on to Gavin Grubbs.

He suffers from debilitating muscular dystrophy, and his wish was to meet race car champion Joey Logano. The day we met them outside Charlotte, Joey took Gavin for a spin. They met six years ago and have become so close, they call or text each other every week. Can you see anymore? Yes, I can. Gavin was a groomsman at Joey's wedding. It all began back when Gavin was eight.

My girl, she is sending you to the Daytona. At a school assembly, Gavin learned he'd get his wish to go to Daytona and meet his hero. Then it got better. Logano had flown to Arkansas to be part of Gavin's surprise. Gavin may have a serious disease, but as you'll see, he doesn't take himself too seriously. So Gavin, tell me, you are fighting a rare form of muscular dystrophy. Yes, sir. How does it affect you? The main thing is I don't have the strength of a normal kid my age. Obviously, I'm in a wheelchair, but it's not all sad because when you've got a disability, people give you free stuff.

They'll let you do cool things. I'm not saying I take advantage of it, but yeah, I take advantage of it. And sometimes I feel a little bad for taking advantage of it, but, you know, it's worth it. Hang on, this idiot. It's okay, no pressure. Gavin gives back, too. He helps raise money for new Wish kids every year. It feels good to help other kids.

That, to me, is maturity beyond your years. You take advantage of the stuff that comes your way, as you should, but you also give back. Make-A-Wish began back in 1980. Seven-year-old Chris Gracious, dying from leukemia, told his parents he wanted to be a police officer. Arizona police made him an officer for a day. The power of his wish launched a movement. Are there wishes you can't grant? The one wish that's the hardest

to say I can't do is can you make me well? That's a tough one. What does that do to you? Break your heart. Don't you cry. Break your heart. Thank you so much. Thank you. Years before she became a volunteer, getting well had been Kendra Street's first wish. At the time, she thought her cancer was fatal. Yes. She was one of those that her first wish was to make me well. So I want to live long enough for my mom to see me graduate high school.

She was a senior that year. They remind you that the little things that we think as adults are so traumatic are so small. I mean, when you think about what these kids are going through, they may not see their next birthday. Kendra saw her next birthday and since then 13 more. Her cancer remains in remission. At Marmaduke, where she teaches, the whole school takes part in Make-A-Wish. They just understand the power of a wish. It's just, once they saw the first wish granted here,

our kids wanted to help give that to someone else. And we're a tiny, tiny school that's raised, last year we raised $15,000. That's incredible. It plays a huge part of who our kids grow up to be. I don't want to overstate this in any way, but did the trip to Australia bolster Caden's will to live? Having Australia with him, having those memories, talking about that, it kind of gives him fuel to fight. Sometimes when I'm sad, I can think of all the happy things I did in Australia and how amazing it was. You're not going to let this cancer win. You saw how courageous Caden was, but unfortunately, this story has a very sad ending. The cancer was relentless. This past September, Caden died. Hit pause on whatever you're listening to and hit play on your next adventure.

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Nearly 13 million people have signed up for Obamacare, but many others have been left out. Millions of Americans can't afford the health insurance exchanges, and for the sake of those people, Obamacare told the states to expand Medicaid, the government insurance for the very poor. But 19 states declined. So in those states, four million people are falling into a gap. They make too much to qualify as destitute for Medicaid, but not enough to buy insurance. As we first reported in April 2014, we met some of these people when we tagged along in a busted RV called the Health Wagon.

Medical mercy for those left out of Obamacare. The tight folds of the Cumberland Mountains mark the point of western Virginia that splits Kentucky and Tennessee, the very center of Appalachia, a land rich in soft coal and hard times. Around Wise County, folks are welcomed by storefronts to remember what life was like before unemployment hit 9%. The roads are narrow and windy curves, so it's not easy to drive the bus. This is Teresa Gardner's territory. She can't be more than 5'4", but she muscles the bus through the hollers.

Death to the complaints of a 13-year-old Winnebago that's left its best miles behind it. I'm having a problem seeing here. You really can't see it. The wipers are nearly shot and the defrosters out cold. There you go. You can see a little better now. Right. I understand there's a hole in the floorboard here somewhere.

Yes, it's right over there, so don't get in that area. The old truck may be a ruin, but like most RVs, it's pretty good at discovering America. Gardner and her partner, Paula Mead, are nurse practitioners aboard the HealthWagon, a charity that puts free health care on the road. How many patients did we have on the schedule today? He was going to see what he can free up for us. The HealthWagon pulls up in parking lots across six counties in southwestern Virginia. Y'all come on in, how's the rain?

It's not long before the waiting room is packed. Hello, Mr. Hank, how are you doing? And two exam rooms are full. Hold your breath for me. With advanced degrees in nursing, Gardner and Mead are allowed to diagnose illnesses, write prescriptions, order tests, and x-rays. On average, there are 20 patients a day. That's recently up by 70%.

The health wagon is a small operation that started back in 1980. It runs mostly on federal grants and corporate and private donations. Blood pressure been high before? Just want to get aggravated. Who are these people who come into the van? They are people that are in desperate need. They have no insurance, and they usually wait, we say, until they are train wrecks. Their blood pressures come in emergency levels.

We have blood sugars come in 500s, 600s because they can't afford their insulin. But why do they not see a doctor or a nurse before they become, as you call it, train wrecks? Because they don't have any money. They don't have money to pay for labs. They don't have money to go to an ER. And these are very proud people. They, you know, you go to the ER, you get a $3,500 bill. And then what do you do? You're given a prescription. You can't feel it. That's why they're train wrecks. They have nowhere else to go. Glenda Moore had nowhere to go but the ER when the pain in her leg became unbearable. Her job at McDonald's making biscuits didn't include insurance that she could afford. The only doctor that would see me, you had to have $114 up front just to be seen. What does $114 mean to your monthly budget? Oh my gosh, that's half of my weekly pay.

I make $7.80 an hour. My paycheck was about, after taxes, about $475 every two weeks. The pain was from a blood clot. She needed Lovenox, a clot buster that costs about $500 for a full treatment. Was she on Lovenox when she was discharged from the hospital? Paula Mead got the call from the ER, which didn't want to bear the cost. The health wagon had the drug for free, and there was no charge for some stern medical advice. You are going to die if you don't quit smoking.

And it could be within a week. You need to stop now. Okay. She took the advice to stop smoking and took Lovenox. But one day, she felt so bad she went back to the ER. And they did a CAT scan and an X-ray and found the blood clot had went to my lung, but they also saw another mass on my lung and then transported me to a bigger hospital. They found the lesions in my brain. So I was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer and brain cancer. What are the doctors

telling you? I start my treatment on Monday, the brain radiation, and he seems very, I mean, he seemed optimistic. Are you hopeful? I am. I have been. I don't know. I just, I feel very hopeful. Hope, especially when the odds are long, has always been essential to survival in Appalachia. The recovery from the Great Recession hasn't arrived. In coal these days, they just take the top off the mountain, and you don't need many men for that. Around here, about a thousand have been laid off in the last two years.

Twelve percent of the folks don't have enough to eat, and we met them waiting for their number at Zion Family Ministries Church, where a charity called Feeding America was handing out just enough to get through a week, if you stretch. 1,654 lined up, a parking lot of possibilities for Gardner, Mead, and the Health Wagon. They've known these people and each other most their lives. You've been together since eighth grade? Yes. Why do you do this work? Because somebody has to. You know, there's people here, you know, we always, we had dreams, we wanted to move away from here. We all, you know, we did. And then we come back and we saw the need. And actually, there's a

vulnerable population here that's different from the rest of America. I mean there are people you can replicate this but we're kind of forgotten. There's no one here to take care of them but us. These patients would be taken care of in the 31 states that expanded Medicaid under Obamacare. The federal government pays the extra cost to the states for three years but Virginia and the others that opted out fear that the cost to the states for three years. But Virginia and the others that opted out fear that the cost in the future could bankrupt them. So the health wagon patients we met have fallen through this unintended gap. Do you have insurance? No, ma'am.

Okay. Have any of you tried to sign up for the president's health insurance plan? No. Why not? I can't afford it. Sissy Cantrell was laid off from a Head Start center. She's been suffering from migraines and seizures. I cry for no reason at all. Have you been seeing a counselor? No. Okay. She came away from the health wagon with medication. Okay. Brittany Phipps works more than 50 hours a week, but that's two part-time jobs,

so there's no insurance for her diabetes. So you're getting your insulin through the health wagon? I am now, yeah. And if that wasn't available, where would you get the insulin? I don't know. Walter Laney's diabetes blinded him in one eye and threatens the other. The health wagon stabilized him and set him up with a specialist. Hey, Walter, Dr. Isaacs. How's it going?

It's going pretty good. How have your sugars been? Okay. They got my blood sugars back under control before this year. I was in the hospital three or four times, and this year I ain't been in none since I've been seeing them. If it hadn't been for them, I don't think I'd be here today. Outside the church where they were handing out food, we met Dr. Joe Smitty,

a lung specialist who's the health wagon's volunteer medical director. This is a third world country of diabetes, hypertension, lung cancer, and COPD. Dr. Smitty drives a second health wagon, a tractor-trailer x-ray lab. I guess they taught you something about radiology and all of that in medical school. Did they teach you how to drive an 18-wheeler? I did have to go to tractor-trailer school, and it took a long time. Was that harder than medical school in some ways? It was very difficult to get anyone to insure a doctor to drive a tractor-trailer.

Insurance companies didn't believe me. Hold it. His x-ray screen is a window on chronic, untreated disease, including black lung from the mines. We've seen co-workers' pneumoconiosis, symphysema, COPD, enlarged hearts. There's 15 of the 26 had significant abnormalities here today. Just today? Just today. But when they leave your health wagon, they still don't have health insurance.

How do they get treated for these things that you're finding? We negotiate. We can talk to the hospital system. We don't leave any patient unattended. We raise money for them. You find a way. We will find a way. They found a way to get Glenda Moore radiation for her brain cancer, but she'd been a smoker for 25 years, and she died

three months after our interview. You don't like this idea of receiving charity. No. Oh, I hate it. My dad was in the military, and when he was diagnosed with cancer, he was taken care of. And I don't know. I just always assumed, you know, that's how it would work. Do you think things would have been different if you'd had an opportunity to go to a doctor more often? Oh, definitely. I know it would be different. The outreach to all the people like Glenda Moore cost the health wagon about a million and a half dollars a year. A third of that is from those federal grants and the rest from donations. Doctors, volunteer and pharmaceutical companies donate drugs. But when we were with them,

we got no electricity like on the house side. They sure could have used a new truck battery. There it goes. Yay! Can we give you all a free flu shot while you're here for helping us? Need a free flu shot, Beaver? These are the ones I think we need to focus on. Teresa Gardner and Paula Mead apply for grants. And travel to churches, praying for donations and passing the plate.

Are there days you say to yourself, I can't do this anymore? Oh, every day. Not every day. I shouldn't say every day. There are a lot of days that you go home and you're so frustrated because we're writing grants until 10 o'clock at night. We're begging for money, and you're almost in tears because we're like, okay, what are we going to do because I've got a family too.

And it gets frustrating. It gets hard. It's enough to wear you out, Teresa. We're pretty beat down by the end of the day on most days, but we do get more out of it than we ever give. When you look at it practically, you think, what in the world am I thinking? But then I have that one patient that may come in and say, couldn't bring you anything, not been able to pay you anything.

Here's a quilt I want to give you. And, I mean, when they do that and they're so heartfelt and they put their arms around you, I don't know what I'd do without you. So you're doing a lot better. It lets you think, okay, I was put here for a purpose. And you can do it another day. You're a blessing to us. Well, thank you.

You all are a blessing to us. It's them, and that's what touches our heart. Since this story first aired, Meade and Gardner have a new health wagon, and it's logged a lot of miles. Virginia has still not expanded Medicaid, and we have this sad news. Walter Laney died of complications from his diabetes. The new Mitsubishi Outlander brings out another side of you. Your regular side listens to classical music. Your adventurous side rocks out with the dynamic sound Yamaha. Regular you owns a library card.

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Pick any two breakfast items for $4. New four-piece French toast sticks, bacon or sausage wrap, biscuit or English muffin sandwiches, small hot coffee, and more. Limited time only at participating Wendy's Taxes Extra. Today, the wealthiest 400 Americans are worth over $2 trillion. Together, it's been reported they own as much wealth as the bottom half of American households combined. While resentment towards the super-rich grows, there may be a silver lining taking shape. It turns out a lot of those rich people are giving staggering sums of

money away in what is being called a golden age of philanthropy. This surge in generosity is not by accident. Much of it is the result of an ambitious and targeted campaign called the Giving Pledge. It was started by an influential trio, Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett. Two years ago, we had the opportunity to get them together to learn more about their new club for billionaires. Membership comes with just two requirements. Be worth at least a billion dollars and be willing to give half of that away. Is it necessary to join the giving pledge that you promise 50% of your net worth? Yes. In your lifetime or in your will?

Or in your will. Are people shocked by that? I don't think so. We're asking them to be bold. We're asking them to step out and to do something big. But a lot of them were already on their way there and just hadn't put a numeric number behind it. And I think now also that the Giving Pledge has gotten going, people know that's the expectation. We don't find a lot of people say, well, I'd join if it was 40%.

And some may even say, I'm happy to give much more than 50%. Oh, most of them. Yeah, most. My guess is that a very significant percentage of our members, I mean, way over half, are going to give a lot more than half. That's certainly true of the founders. The Gates have already committed to giving 95 percent of their wealth away. Warren Buffett, 99 percent. They say that kind of extreme giving is needed because the rich have been getting so much richer. Tech innovations and rising global markets have produced vast fortunes not seen since the Industrial Revolution.

So what does Warren Buffett say to convince today's billionaires to give their fortunes away? Incremental wealth, adding to the wealth they have now, has no real utility to them. But that wealth has incredible utility to other people. It can educate children. It can vaccinate children. It can do all kinds of things. There are others and people that I know say, I want to give it to my children. That's what I want to do. What's wrong with that? I don't really think that as a society, we want to confer blessings on generation after generation who contribute nothing to society simply because somebody in the far distant past happened to

amass a great sum of wealth. So far, 115 billionaires have bought Buffett's argument and signed the giving pledge. Ages range from 27 to 98. Some inherited wealth, but most are self-made. Their businesses range from technology and social media to pizza, hair care, and home improvement. Combined pledges so far, over a half a trillion dollars. What conditions are there? I mean, can they say, yes, I'm with you, I'm here, but I want to give it to this institution or that institution?

I don't care what institution they give it to. We're not endorsing any flavor of philanthropy. We do think we're all going to be smarter and do it better learning from each other, but there's no pooling of money, and we celebrate the diversity of philanthropy. Billionaires can be shy when it comes to talking about their money, but Warren Buffett helped convince seven who have signed the pledge to sit down with 60 Minutes.

They are investors Pete Peterson and Nicholas Berggruen, South African mining tycoon Patrice Mozepe, and his wife, Dr. Precious Molloy Mozepe, entrepreneur Sarah Blakely, and AOL founder Steve Case, and his wife, Jean. When did you first hear of the Giving Pledge? Melinda called and talked to us, but we had the benefit of knowing Bill and Melinda for a long time, going back to our technology roots.

We competed against them for many years. We did. We were happy to finally join forces. You wanted against them for many years. We did. We're happy to finally join forces. You want to be on their side? We want to be on the line. They've all signed the same pledge, and they bring the same brashness to their philanthropic ambition

that helped them build financial empires. Charlie, this is a group made up largely of entrepreneurs. And they didn't make a billion dollars or five billion dollars by doing the ordinary. They did it by being bold. That's certainly true for Sarah Blakely. Well, I made all the money by making other people's butts look a lot better. I think you missed me.

In 2000, she took $5,000 in savings and started the undergarment company Spanx. Now she wants her philanthropy to be as cutting edge as her billion-dollar business. I started my business with an invented product that didn't exist and shook up an industry. And I want to collaborate with people and increase my chances of coming up with an idea or something that will do that for my cause, which is helping women. At 42, Blakely admits she's just beginning to figure out how she'll help women. At 83, Warren Buffett says he wants to stick with what he's good at, running his company, Berkshire Hathaway. So he's given the bulk of his fortune to the Bill

and Melinda Gates Foundation so it can be used to reduce global poverty and disease. As for the other pledgers, they're tackling an impressive array of causes, unemployment in South Africa, early detection and treatment of brain cancer, and some interests that take on a more political tone, tax reform in California and the national debt. But as Bill Gates discovered when he left Microsoft, going from making money to giving it away isn't always easy. An example of just one of the lessons he's learned, it doesn't matter how effective a vaccine is, if you don't package and deliver it the right way, it will not do any good. I guess there's a learning process, too. Absolutely. Because you feel like, how do you do this even if you're inclined to do it?

It's almost disconcerting to switch to an area where you're back at square zero a little bit, and the measurements aren't quite the same as in the business game. What you're trying to do, the need to take risk, try different things. And so you need encouragement. That's why Buffett and the Gates invite pledgers once a year to exclusive resorts like Kiowa Island in South Carolina. Here, billionaires attend seminars on how to give money away more effectively. Our cameras were not allowed in, but we were shown this day's agenda. It included lessons on how tools like technology can be used to transform failing schools,

and with the government cutting funding on medical research, how can philanthropists step in and help spur new medical breakthroughs? But we wondered, what else goes on behind closed doors. Will there be a conversation here about failure? Sure. Yes, there most definitely will be. And what is that? How do you phrase it?

Well, if you bat 1,000, you're playing in the little leagues. I mean, and the problem for major leagues. The difference in the entrepreneurial world, when you launch a company, you have a particular idea, a particular product, a particular service. Almost always, you pivot, you shift. The market reacts to your initial idea, you make some adjustments. It's only after making a few adjustments that you see the success. We need that same mentality in philanthropy, trying things, taking risks, recognizing the first try, maybe the second try, maybe the third try won't work. But if you stay at it and you're learning, you're talking to others

and you're learning together, eventually you'll break through and see the kind of impact you were hoping for. Jeffrey Skoll, one of the first to sign the Giving Pledge, is using the billions he made as eBay's first president to fight what he calls global threats. Not just one, but five problems he's convinced pose immediate danger to humanity. Climate change, water security, pandemics, nuclear proliferation, and the Middle East conflict. Is there some argument to make sometimes that because people made a lot of money, that they may come to these problems with a certain arrogance, like,

I know everything there is to know. I'm a smart guy. Let me tell you what to do. I think we all have a danger of arrogance, like we know the answers. And the reality is we don't. But that does not keep Skoll from trying. In addition to this more traditional charitable giving, in 2004, he started the for-profit media company Participant to make movies that promote his philanthropic goals. And the purpose of the movies is what? Awareness is one. To create entertainment that inspires and

compels social change. And so whether that is climate change or dolphin hunting in Japan or dealing with drug sentencing laws. Every film we do has a purpose, and it has a social action campaign associated with the movie. And we try to get people involved in the issues of the movie to try to make a difference in those issues. But the problem with all of this may be that it shows how quickly charity can cross over into advocacy. Take the 2011 movie Contagion. Skoll took what he'd learned through his charitable work in pandemics and funded a movie to warn people that a virus could kill billions. On day one, there were two people, and then four, and then 16. In three months,

it's a billion. That's where we're headed. And what did the movie accomplish for you? In many ways, it put pandemics back on the map, that the public realized how important our public health organizations are, for example. A number of politicians that had seen the movie, who were ready to vote on cuts to funding to the CDC recognized that that would be a bad idea. The public has a right to know who owns the world.

Randall Lane, the editor of the business magazine Forbes, says billionaires like Skoll have become so influential he devoted an entire issue to philanthropy. Government is showing, you know, over the past couple decades that it can no longer solve the great problems of the day. Now, these philanthropists who have incredible wealth, the problem-solving brainpower, and also the name and the influence to be able to open doors

are uniquely qualified right now to solve the huge problems. But that does raise the question, do these billionaires have too much power? There's some people who say big philanthropy is not such a good idea, meaning that somehow you have enormous power and you're not elected and that that may not be such a good idea to have people with enormous wealth to have so much influence. Well, would they prefer dynastic wealth? be such a good idea to have people with enormous wealth to have so much influence? Well, would they prefer dynastic wealth? Or would they prefer, you know, obscenely high living? There's a couple other ways to get rid of money, but I think it's better if you're helping other people and using a good bit of it for helping other people.

So there's no instance in which somebody could say, look, I mean, we've got too many people of huge wealth who are having too much influence. Well, Charlie, think about Bill and polio, for instance, Bill and Melinda's work in polio. I mean, they're coming close to eradicating polio on the face of the earth. I think when we have a couple of examples like that, people will see that's not power being used for personal purposes. That's really leveraging everything you have to change the world to make it better. But as Warren Buffett is finding out, not every billionaire feels that way. I've gotten a lot of yeses when I've called people, but I've gotten a lot of no's too. And I am tempted because I've been calling people with a billion dollars or more. They can't sign

up for 50 percent. Maybe I should write a book on how to get by on 500 million. There's a lot of people that don't really know how to do it. Since our story first aired, another 28 billionaires, now totaling 143 people from 15 different countries, have signed the giving pledge. In the mail this week, viewers wrote to us about the story that we called the resurrection of St. Benedict's. At the Inner City Boys Prep School in Newark, New Jersey, the students run much of the school. Educators and families need to create more opportunities for kids like this school. So uplifting. Keep showing these positive stories. But other viewers found something lacking at St. Benedict's.

Your story about St. Benedict's was nice, but what do they do for the girls from that neighborhood? I'm Scott Pelley. We'll be back next week with another edition of 60 Minutes.