Salesforce Co-CEO Marc Benioff is passionate in bringing an end to homelessness and inequality in San Francisco, California. Benioff is campaigning for businesses to take action in helping fund the city’s efforts to provide affordable housing for everyone. Joining Salesforce in this philanthropy are Microsoft and Google, both also tech giants in their respective fields.
Supporting Prop C
Being a long-time resident of the Bay Area, Benioff has seen countless evidence of poor housing and inequality over the years, with lots of people sleeping on the streets and loitering everywhere despite the otherwise high-income generated by the city’s tech-driven economy.
Benioff has acknowledged that San Francisco’s housing plans need a large deal of fixing, saying that there has been “poor planning” amidst the technological boom the city is experiencing. He envisions San Francisco with built-in social housing so that even if the city offers high-end residential places, everybody from all sorts of income levels can still be accommodated.
Salesforce’s Co-CEO further says that the government must step in to manage the massive problem of inequality and homelessness. He also declares that businesses must also give their fair share in improving the lives of homeless people everywhere. Hence, he supported the local measure called Proposition C (Prop C) to help ease homelessness in California.
Prop C is a measure mandating all businesses with revenues higher than $50 million to be taxed an additional 0.5% on top of their income. Money collected from these businesses will then be used to fund programs for the homeless, such as low-cost housing for low-income families and beds for displaced city dwellers. California already started implementing this measure as of writing.
Standing Together with Salesforce
Tech behemoths Google and Microsoft also pitched in to help ease homelessness and inequality in their respective home areas.
Google recently gave $3 million for the implementation of homelessness solutions proposed by San Francisco Mayor London Breed. Collectively, the search engine giant has donated over $240 million for causes such as homelessness, education, and economic development.
Meanwhile, Microsoft announced its allocation of $500 million to fund housing initiatives around their headquarters in Seattle. They made this announcement in mid-January after realizing the extent of the homelessness problem in the area.
In a Nutshell
Homelessness and inequality are major problems in San Francisco, but businesses and tech giants are increasingly taking measures to help ease these dilemmas. Salesforce is a staunch advocate and participant in Proposition C, a move to improve funding for homelessness projects. Google and Microsoft join Salesforce in their efforts to fight homelessness and inequality as well.