Billionaires at The Gates

Bill and Melinda Gates
Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images
Theodore Schleifer
May 31, 2022

This Wednesday, private planes and caravans will shepherd dozens of the world’s most financially successful people to a luxury resort north of Los Angeles for a conference that you will never hear anything about. Until Thursday night, on the grounds of an Ojai, California hideout, Bill and Melinda French Gates will hold court as they have for the last ten years atop the Giving Pledge, the network of 200-plus luminaries whom the Gateses have recruited to join them in philanthropy and who gather, once a year, at elite retreats like this one.