David Green, the 80-year-old founder of the Hobby Lobby arts and crafts chain, says he's turned over ownership of his multibillion-dollar empire to a nonprofit trust rather than pass it down to his children, saying he's "chosen God" over wealth.
However, by turning over the business, he may have also saved himself from paying millions of dollars in capital gains taxes that keeping the chain in the family name could have cost, The New York Post pointed out Tuesday.
Accoording to the Post, the move is akin to when Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard last month announced transferring his sportswear brand.
By rerouting almost all the Patagonia profits to environmental preservation organizations, Chouinard avoided federal estate and gift taxes amounting to 40%, according to Bloomberg News.
Green, in an opinion piece for Fox News, compared his decision to that made by Chouinard, saying that it allows Hobby Lobby to "sustain our mission and purpose."
But Bloomberg reports that Chouinard has a net wealth of $1.2 billion, as calculated by Forbes, meaning he may have saved more than $700 million in capital gains taxes through the transfer of 98% of the Patagonia shares to a nonprofit.
Green's wealth though, was valued by Forbes at $13.7 billion.
Hobby Lobby didn't respond to requests for comment from the Post, but this weekend, he told Fox News that "wealth can be a curse and, in most cases, if you drill down on it, wealth is a curse in terms of marriage, children, and things of that nature," Green said.
He added that "we’re stewarding our company and, therefore, our children come to work, and they get what they earn … it’s a paradigm change from ownership that can really wreck a family."
He also said that he was not comfortable with a business owner selling a company and keeping the profits for "yourself and your family."
"Well-meaning attorneys and accountants advised me to simply pass ownership down to my children and grandchildren," Green added this weekend. "It didn’t seem fair to me that I might change or even ruin the future of grandchildren who had not even been born yet."
Meanwhile, Green wrote in the opinion piece that thought of himself as a steward of the company, not its owner, and recalled when he almost lost his business in the 1980s when he had "grown proud thinking that I had the Midas touch."
He also said he credits "prayer and the Bible" as his "source of truth" and said he believes that if owners "pray and seek truth from the Bible that their businesses will be revolutionized."
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