Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates is looking to his friend and fellow billionaire Warren Buffett for some inspiration on how to keep working into his nineties.
Gates, 68, said he intends to keep working for at least another two decades if his health allows—following in the footsteps of the 94-year-old Berkshire Hathaway CEO.
That’s because retirement “sounds awful” to Gates, a father of three.
“My friend Warren Buffett still comes into the office six days a week,” Gates told CNBC’s Make It in an interview released over the weekend. “So, I hope my health allows me to be like Warren.”
Buffett, though, is clearly aware that time is marching on.
Following the death of his friend and right-hand man, Charlie Munger, in November last year, Buffett has spoken multiple times about what will happen to his $145 billion fortune.
That has included previewing his will and confirming that following his death, no further funds will be given to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Gates is keen to continue the work for this foundation over the next few decades.
The foundation has spent more than $53 billion since 2000, hoping to help with issues such as eradicating polio, water sanitization, and agricultural development.
But there are landmarks yet to be met, which Gates is determined to be involved in.
“The foundation will celebrate its 25th anniversary next year. We haven’t gotten rid of polio, we haven’t got rid of malaria. I’m very, very committed to those things,” says Gates. “We want to cut childhood deaths in half again, from 5 million to 2.5 million.”
Perhaps unsurprisingly, helping achieve this goal will mean a lot of work, which is why Gates is eyeing “at least 10 years, if my health allows, working at this level.”
“Hopefully it’ll be more like 20 or 30,” he added.
Change of pace
While Gates intends to continue working at a high level, he won’t do so with the same tenacity as he did when he launched Microsoft.
While launching the $2.99 trillion behemoth with childhood friend Paul Allen, Gates would stand in his office overlooking the car park to see which of his employees were leaving first.
Sleeping as little as possible became something of a competition with peers, the man worth $157 billion said on his podcast Unconfuse Me With Bill Gates last year.
The tech tycoon told comedian Seth Rogen and Rogen’s wife, Lauren Miller Rogen: “In my thirties and forties when there would be a conversation about sleep it would be like ‘Oh, I only sleep six hours.’
“And the other guy says ‘Oh, I only sleep five,’ then ‘Well, sometimes I don’t sleep at all.’ I’d be like ‘Wow, those guys are so good, I have to try harder because sleep is laziness and unnecessary.'”
Since then, Gates has changed his tune, telling CNBC: “I don’t work as hard [now]. In my twenties, I didn’t believe in weekends and vacations. So, that was kind of out of control, how I pushed myself.”
On his podcast with Rogen and Miller Rogen last August, Gates discussed Alzheimer’s—a topic he is still heavily invested in.
Bill Gates Sr. died at home in September 2020 after a battle with Alzheimer’s that had begun more than a decade prior.
“I spent yesterday on Alzheimer’s disease,” Gates told CNBC. “Intellectually, in terms of staying up to date—even just on [artificial intelligence] alone—takes a lot of time. But it’s still incredibly fulfilling.”
