Question - I am 15 so this question is relevant to me: Did you ever think or dream that you would become one of the richest people in the world? Toby Watson (100557.3304 compuserve.com)
Answer - No, I never thought I'd be rich. It wasn't even a dream. What excited me, and still excites me, is the prospect of making a difference.
When I was your age I expected to have a successful career, and I thought I might inherit money at some point. But even 10 years later, after my company was a success, it never crossed my mind that someone from the software industry could accumulate much wealth.
In the early days we wanted to make enough money to hire our friends to write software. The passion had a lot more to do with making our software popular than it did with reaping big profits.
Even today, what interests me isn't making money per se. If I had to choose between my job and having great wealth, I'd choose the job. It's a much bigger thrill to lead a team of thousands of talented, bright people than it is to have a big bank account.
Keep in mind that almost all of my assets are tied up as stock in my company. I own roughly a quarter of Microsoft, a proportion that will decline only slightly over time.
Having a large stake helps me ensure that the company can take an unusually long-term approach to business challenges. Keeping nearly all of my money in productive investments also suits me philosophically.
The key trade-off a society makes is how much money to put into future improvement vs. how much to put into present consumption. It's good for society when people invest a lot of their money rather than using it all to live well today.
One impressive quality of Japan is its high savings rate. A lot of its wealth is invested, which strengthens its ability to take a long-term approach.
In contrast the United States has a low savings rate, in part because the U.S. tax code doesn't encourage saving. In theory, at least, the U.S. economy would be stronger if consumption rather than income were taxed.
Under a progressive consumption tax, you might not be taxed at all if you consumed relatively little of society's resources. You'd be taxed very heavily on extravagances like expensive homes, boats and domestic help. The more you spent, the higher the tax rate would soar.
Regardless of what happens with the tax code, most of my money will remain right where it is for the time being.
I'm the steward of a share of society's resources. Eventually I'll return most of it as contributions to causes I believe in, such as education and population stability.
I've donated $270 million to charities, including $200 million to my foundation, in the past several years. I'll continue to give, very carefully.
Giving away money effectively is almost as hard as earning it in the first place. I'm many years away from wanting to divert a lot of my attention in that direction - and I don't want to presuppose today what my thinking will be then.
One thing is for sure. I won't leave a lot of money to my heirs because I don't think it would be good for them.
So when my children are your age, they can dream of being rich. But if their dreams come true, it won't be because Dad gave them a lot of money.
Question - I believe that online services will have great impact. But how can we avoid having the Third World miss the biggest revolution in modern times? Philippe Piessens, Belgium (piesses@glo.be)
Answer - Over the next 50 years, the digital revolution will benefit the Third World much more than the developed world.
The transformation of industrialized nations is beginning already. By the middle of the next century most people on Earth will share in the technological windfall. It will take decades longer in some places than in others, but the revolution will reach all corners of the earth.
The result will be enormous improvements in the standard of living for people everywhere but most of all for people in developing countries where even telephone service is rare today.
The Internet, low-orbit satellites and other communications technologies will help developing nations catch up in areas such as education, health care, entertainment and economic opportunity.
Question - I just finished "The Road Ahead." Are you going to write another book in the near future? Jerry Lazzareschi (jerrylaz@deltanet.com)
Answer - It's a lot of work to write a book and I don't expect to do it again soon. But I revised "The Road Ahead" this year, and it's such a thorough overhaul that in many ways it is new. I rewrote several chapters and added about 20,000 new words.
It's unusual to revise a book completely just a year after it was published, but it was necessary because my near-term view of the future has changed so much in the past year. The rise of the Internet provoked me to reinvent my company, and the book needed the same re-evaluation.
I really enjoyed the opportunity to go back and make improvements to the book, and to describe why the near future is coming at us more quickly - and somewhat differently - than I described in the first edition.
The revision, published by Penguin, will be available in English this fall and other languages by early next year.
As with the first edition, my proceeds from the book go to educational charities worldwide.
Questions may be sent to Bill Gates by electronic mail. The address is askbill@microsoft.com. Or write to him care of the New York Times Syndication Sales Corp., 122 E. 42nd St., New York, NY 10168. Bill Gates regrets that unpublished questions cannot be answered individually.