Dear MacKenzie Bezos,
It’s been a little over a year since your divorce from Jeff was finalized, and we have an idea for you. It’s a doozy: a way to give back while getting even.
Forbes just declared that at this moment you are worth $62.3 billion and that you’re the richest woman in America. Why don’t you take a tiny fraction of that fortune and create a foundation dedicated to improving the working conditions of Amazon employees?
While your ex-husband is busy overcompensating, shooting his little rockets into the void, you could show what we are truly most impressed by right now: generosity of spirit. Everybody oohs and aahs over Andrew Carnegie, who gave away 90 percent of his wealth. His widow, Louise, was also a philanthropist, but because Andrew was the big-ticket giver in the family, he got all the credit and name plaques on libraries.
Back to Jeff. The entire world knows how shabbily many Amazon employees were treated at the start of the coronavirus pandemic—frontline workers in Amazon warehouses didn’t get enough masks and protective gear (at least eight are known to have died) or even adequate paid sick leave; people who complained or tried to strike were fired.
Instead of raising wages, Jeff is currently running glossy, expensive television commercials touting how safe and grateful Amazon workers are—the ads look like UNICEF fundraising spots.
We know he can’t be shamed into doing the right thing—this is an ex who reportedly spent $165 million on a mansion in Beverly Hills in February so he could be closer to his girlfriend, Lauren Sanchez (Yuck. Men), after his company paid zero federal taxes in 2018—even though Amazon reported a profit of $11.2 billion that year.
But we are embarrassed for you, and we know you want to do something meaningful with your money.
Amazon has blocked all efforts to unionize. So, the MacKenzie Bezos Foundation for Mistreated Amazon Workers (or MacMaw) could give bonuses to supplement the salaries of underpaid warehouse employees. You could call the payments “Bezosprime.”
Instead of raising wages, Jeff is currently running glossy, expensive television commercials touting how safe and grateful Amazon workers are—the ads look like UNICEF fundraising spots.
Your foundation could provide better benefits and offer child care and elder care for working parents. There could be MacKenzie Bezos pre-schools, MacKenzie Bezos adult-education classes, MacKenzie Bezos scholarships, McKenzie Bezos research grants, MacKenzie Bezos wellness clinics, MacKenzie Bezos assisted-living homes, MacKenzie Bezos organic farms, MacKenzie Bezos housing complexes, all for the benefit of Amazon’s 800,000 employees—and society.
You get the drift.
Bonus: you might set a trend in your peer group.
If you believe the tabloids (and who doesn’t?), then Rebecca Borgerson just had her best week since her ex-husband, Scott, 44, left her and their two kids for Ghislaine Maxwell, the alleged Epstein-enabler who is 14 years older than Scott. (Yuck. Men.) Ghislaine was denied bail on Tuesday, and back she goes to a truly horrible detention center in Brooklyn for a year before trial.
Scott isn’t a billionaire, but if his company is worth around $100 million, half of that is a nice nest egg. Before her capture, Ghislaine was holed up in a 156-acre New Hampshire hideaway she reportedly bought for $1 million under a fake identity—Rebecca should buy it and turn it into the Rebecca Borgerson Halfway House for Children Rescued from Sex Traffickers. A giant portrait of Ghislaine with a big no-go slash across the face could grace the front hall.
What’s the point of being a first wife named Rebecca if you can’t exact revenge on your successor?
Elena Rybolovleva, if you are reading this, come on down.
Nobody knows what you and your Russian-oligarch ex, Dmitry Rybolovlev, finally settled on in 2015; a Swiss court initially awarded you $4.5 billion, but by the time you formally split, it could have been less. Or more. But everyone knows that your Trump-accommodating, art-guzzling, palace-collecting $6 billion man wildly overspent to buy the da Vinci masterpiece Salvator Mundi, for a reported $127 million—twice what the dealer Yves Bouvier paid. How do you say putz in Russian? Oh, right: дурак.
What’s the point of being a first wife named Rebecca if you can’t exact revenge on your successor?
дурак Dmitry sued Bouvier for inflating prices but just lost the court case, presumably because judges figured—caveat emptor—that Dmitry should have googled the painting. (Besides, Saudi prince Mohammed bin Salman apparently bought it for his mega-yacht in 2017 for $450 million.)
So, open the Elena Rybolovleva Art and Economics Institute in Dmitry’s hometown of Perm and teach courses on fine-art appraisal. Sometimes, less is more.
We’d loop in Melania Trump, except that, should she and her husband divorce, it’s pretty clear that Deadbeat Donald would never pay up.
So, MacKenzie, this is all on you now. Don’t forget the divorcée’s motto: His happiness is a small price to pay for your freedom.
Best wishes on this first anniversary,
Your friends at Air Mail
