Jon Stewart asked JK Rowling why she gave away so much of her money.

It's nice to see humility instead of entitlement.

Makes me smile.

J.K. Rowling Loses Billionaire Status by Being a Lovely and Charitable Person:

Just when you thought J.K. Rowling couldn't be any more magical, she goes and gets booted from the Forbes list of the World's Billionaires after giving away a huge sum of her earnings to charity. Her charitable donations, coupled with Britain's high tax rates, have cost the author an estimated $160 million (does anyone know the galleon conversion rate on that?). Rowling continues to show up on Forbes' list of powerful women, however, ranking in at number 61.

See also: J.K. Rowling Is No Longer A Billionaire, Booted Off Forbes List

Cracked says her rags to riches story is not entirely true. See #2:

http://www.cracked.com/article_16989_6-inspiring-rags-to-riches-stories-that-are-bullshit_p2.html

Nonetheless, it's clear that she did pay a lot of taxes, and she has donated a lot of money.

J.K. Rowling is a good woman.

A small tribute to JK Rowling: http://imgur.com/gallery/E9OCg

I don't think it's quite fair to say that going on the dole was part of her "business plan".  She was apparently fleeing an abusive marriage with a baby, her beloved mother was dying, and although she was a university graduate she was not in fact an "educated teacher who quit her job" exactly -- she'd been teaching English in Portugal, but she didn't have a UK teacher's credential and her abusive husband was in Portugal.

I think the fairest thing to say is that Rowling is the ABSOLUTE BEST CASE SCENARIO of welfare moms.  She was on welfare for a very limited period of time while she concentrated on getting out of a temporary hole and working towards a better future for herself and her child.  Rowling accurately saw herself having two assets:  the novel she'd been working on for 7 years, and her ability to teach if she earned a credential.  She pursued both, and the riskier one turned into the jackpot of all time.  I don't think the whole thing was as calculated or as desperation-free as "business plan" makes it sound.

I also note she's very good to her kids. Look at this treehouse she got them.

So she's not giving all of her money away. Just enough of it to put a dent in her billionaire status.

I would too.. give it all away.. does anyone really need more than say, a few million, to not have to work again, so you can work on bettering the world?  The rest should all go into making the world better, because it's so screwed up.