NBA’s Only Haitian-Born Player Samuel Dalembert Donates $100,000 in Support of Relief

I did the quick approx math, if you average 100K a year before tax, you'd need to make about $7K contribution to be equivalent.

Yes and no. If we are to compare standard of living and living comfortably then everyone in the U.S. should be donating a lot more because our standard of living is significantly higher than other parts of the world. We'd probably only need a very small percentage of our earnings to meet the basic Maslow's needs. As some one whole only needed about ~$200 a month after rent to live in college and still felt relatively comfortable, I would venture to make the point that "comfort" living can be achieved w/ anything $15K+. But obviously, we are ALL much more materialistic and most of our comfort aren't just needs but things we WANT. As a millionaire athlete, a human being like all of us, there are lot more options and wants, not to mention other temptation and people trying to take advantage of him. I hate to go Sprewell and go they make more but spend more, but they do. Anytime you're giving up something of this size, let's not belittle his sacrifice and say that you'd EXPECT him to do something like this. He is giving up something he wants when he donates $100K.

 

that's 7% of your income if you make 100,000. your calculations are wrong.
what is 7% of 50,000,000? it's $3,500,000.00. that is nowhere near 100,000.

and fine you can make the argument that he has to pay for his ferraris and women etc. etc. but that is a pretty lame excuse. he has the ability to almost single-handedly fund a large portion of the relief and still pay for his toys.

 

Clutchfans: Where "its never enough" happens.

 

Seriously guys, maybe he could afford more, but that's a ton of money. That's a lot of money. It doesn't matter how much you make, that's 100,000 dollars.

Also, he has no responsibility to give anything in the first place. He doesn't have to do anything. Anything is generous.

 

Look at my last post, it's about the likely lifetime salary potential, he'll have to live off what he earns these 8 to 12 years for the rest of his life. I've stated my calculations in the last post but I'll do it again. $100K before tax * 40 years of work = $4Mil. After tax at lower tax bracket $2.8 Mil. 0.25% of that will come out too.....$7K.

My point isn't that he'll live comfortably or not, my point is that if you look at what he's given up relative to what he can have (based on pure math), it's not insignificant if looking at what we would have to give up relative to what we can have. Let's say he gives up this $100K and it's a decent import. You say he still have a lot left. However, if you make $100K and give up $7K (2 - 3 large HDTVs, trips to Europe etc.), relative to the life you can have if you average $100K a year and not made the donation, in the grand scheme of things it's not a big deal, your quality of life has not diminished significantly (just like the $100K he donated will not diminish his life significantly). However, if you do make that donation, I bet you would consider the act generous.

 

how much have you donated?

 

I didn't say I was generous :grin:

Though one of the groups/association that I'm part of at work might organize some fund raising event so I'm waiting to see what's going on with that before I make any private donations. Though I will say on a relative basis, I probably wont be as generous as Sam Dalembert (which is my point, that most of us aren't so we should stop criticizing him for not "donating enough").

 

It's a shame that people don't bother reading anything. From the interview in the OP

Dalembert has his own foundation for helping Haiti kids. And he's trying to use his influence to get others to help the right way. He's also donatinng more in addition to his initial 100 grand.

The guy is not a superstar. He doesn't have a big shoe deal or oozing in advertising money. His NBA salary has to last him the rest of his life, likely. Half of that money already goes to the government. Even $100,000 is quite a substantial amount of money.

 

you are overcomplicating it. if i were making 100k/year i would happily give 7000 of it.

your calculation is if one has 2.8 million in the bank already. which most of us dont. yeah, if i wait 40 years and have that amount then 7000 is not a large amount. i think in that case, 100k would be a generous figure to donate. but for those of us who have to work everyday in a job we most likely hate and pay that probably doesnt match the amount of stress and time we have to put into our jobs, it doesnt make sense for us to donate a large percentage of our savings just because "in 40 years we wil have approximately 2.8 million.." thats assuming you dont get laid off or fired or your wife leaves you or what have you.

this guy and other athletes/celebs who have the 50 mil. already paid and he is seeing another 12 million next year? ppl like that can afford to give more. and since they are fortunate enough to be pulling a large amount of money to play a game (that we basically pay for as fans) then you give back to your community. It isnt the law but it is the right thing to do imho.

 

oh. well, in that case. kudos to him. i thought it was kinda weird that he was just giving 100k (relative to what he has). i was actually thinking there has to be more that he is doing.

 

LOL Tmac donated 1 MILLION, and he isn't even Haitian. And he still got flamed! You got that right, only on clutchfans :grin:

 

Its all a matter of perspective. Technically speaking, you don't need money at all, your government will pay for you. That's why saying he's a multi-millionaire he can afford more is just the height of ignorance for me. Dalembert is a millonaire, but you don't know the circumstances of his life, he might have bought a house or something, and its not like he has endorsements like Tmac or Kobe. His salary is his lifetime earnings, next year his salary is only 12 million. After taxes it becomes 6 million, and after his agent's cut maybe around 5.5. How do you feel about giving away 20% of your yearly income?

Why don't you donate a larger amount, then tell him he isn't donating enough? The scale is different, but Dalembert isn't donating more simply because of the same reasons you aren't donating more/if you do at all.

 

well, dalembert is giving more. so its kind of a dead issue now. which goes to show that IF he were just giving 100k then it would be considered small.
the average person in the US can live quite well for the next 10 years on 1 million. now compare that to an income of 50-100k. one would be living around the poverty line if you tried to stretch that out for 10 years. dalembert has over 10 million. it isnt wrong for him to only give less than .5% of his income (if that were the case, which it isnt), but it does make him look a little stingy.

 

Many posters in this thread are hypocritical assholes and I won't be returning to this one...

 

Some of you guys are pretty friggin sick...there are people dying and Dalembert's money is going to help stop that. Thats not enough for you folks...shameless. Let me know when you guys donate a 100k...

 

I think Dalembert is generous and stepping up to the plate and I assume he does more than I could ever know about.

That said there are some posters who's ideas about money and how it scales that are way off. Basically they are forgetting that money begets more money (assuming you don't crap it all away on nothing ala Antoine Walker). Basically when you earn that level of income it takes only a modest investment strategy to set yourself up to earning a level of interest that would far surpass an average person's life time top income year. An average person takes a lifetime to save a principal on which they could live reasonably comfortably but at $12 million per you could do it in a year.

Also so at 35 or so when an NBA player retires what's this notion that they can't continue to work? It won't be at the same pay rate but there's nothing stopping them from continuing to work.

Finally what is this idea that the average American income in $100k/yr? That's crazy. The Median income for a household (usually two income earners) is somewhere in the $40k's.