Xiong Shuihua, a Chinese multimillionaire, bulldozed his old decrepit hometown to build luxury condos for everyone, for free, as a humble “thank you.”
Some stories just put a smile on your face. So often our image of rich business moguls is associated with egocentric, narcissistic men who greedily spend their fortunes on penthouses, speedboats, and private jets.
But Xiong Shuihua, a Chinese multimillionaire who earned his own fortune in the steel construction business, has shattered this stereotype, demonstrating philanthropy at its best and proving the existence of “good” in places often seen as grim.
Xiong Shuihua was born in Xiongkeng village in the city of Xinyu, southern China, and said that his family had always been well looked after and supported by community residents during his childhood.
So, after making his millions in the steel industry, Shuihua opted to repay his debt to his childhood community by “updating” the locals’ living spaces.
Five years ago, the area was considerably run-down, with most locals living in the most basic of homes.
Today, however, the area has been completely transformed, and now 72 families are enjoying a new quality of life in what can be considered “luxury flats.”
Furthermore, 18 families who were particularly kind to the businessman were given villas of their own, in a project costing close to $7.4 million.
After moving in, he even promised three meals a day to the older residents and people on a low income to make sure they could get by.
“I earned more money than I knew what to do with, and I didn’t want to forget my roots,” he told the Daily Mail; “I always pay my debts, and wanted to make sure the people who helped me when I was younger and my family were paid back.”
Xiong Shuihua’s incredibly selfless gesture is the sort of deed that could really create #change in our world. If, for example, the top percentage of wealthy people around the globe decided to allocate even the smallest portion of their wealth for philthanropistic causes such as this, the amount of people whose lives would change for the better would be monumental. Let’s hope we keep seeing more of this taking place in our world.
Do you know of any other inspiring philanthropy stories? Share with us in the comment section below!
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Wonderful gift to his childhood neighbours in home town village. An honourable man giving the gift of gratitude in a constructive way.
A “gift” is a great way to put. The article says he owed a “debt” to his childhood community. He owed no such debt. In the US the feds take and waste so much of our tax money distributing help that people like me give way less than we otherwise would.
People like you never give anything away, anyhow. The wealthy pay FAR LESS in taxes than any other time over the last 50 years. That is a FACT. And they are WEALTHIER than ever. So, please don’t use the fact that you have to pay taxes as an excuse for not giving back to the community.
And maybe this gentleman did not owe a debt in the LEGAL sense, but he felt he was morally obligated to give back. I agree with him. Despite what you may think, you are NOT 100% responsible for your own success. Yes, you may work very hard. But the fact is, from birth, you received the benefits of being a US Citizen. You were educated in our schools. You were fed safe food because we have people to inspect the food supply. You were able to have the vaccinations against all of the diseases that kill people elsewhere. Your family, your friends, your teachers and the entire community played a part in making you who you are. So, while you may be successful and you may have worked hard for your success, you DO have to recognize that it was the collective efforts of a lot of people who helped to get you there.
When you whine that taxes are just a waste of money, you sound like a selfish child whose parents never taught him how to SHARE. You didn’t pop out of the womb an instant success. Whether or not you want to use your money for good things or not is up to you. But please stop going on about how you deserve every penny you have and how the government takes too much from you. Because you take a lot from society whether or not you want to admit it.
Totally agreeing to disagree here Josh, President Barrack Obama has raised the taxes on the wealthy. Also, you’re saying we received the benefit of being a US citizen…how do you know that is a benefit? From what i see I’d rather be in that Chinese town eating bowls of rice all day, but in the US? Hmm, we are severely in debt, we produce the worlds most ridiculous things in entertainment, we dropped in math, science, hell even English all across the world.
Boo Hoo Josh talk about a whinger take a look in your own mirror you might see one
The latest IRS figures available are for 2012. It shows that the top 1% pay 38% of all federal income tax while earning only 21.9% of income. The top 1%, which is only 1.3 million filers, paid a greater share of income taxes than the bottom 90% combined, which is 122 million filers! The bottom 90% paid only a combined 29.8% of all federal income tax. So come on, let us hear more of your class warfare.
Well stated in my opinion Josh.
You are right on! Thank you for that. The best statements I have heard to date. Thank you!
Are you not also at fault? You are making an assumption that Duke is rich (or well off). You are also making assumptions about the way taxes work. Taxes are a percentage of your pay. Although I agree that the percentage could use some tinkering, technically we all pay the same percentage to the US government. It’s not possible to state that people with more money pay less taxes. The difference is the ability to afford accountants that know where to find deductions when filing.
I agree that in the article this man felt he owed a moral debt as opposed to a legal debt which is what makes this story beautiful. This is actually more of a question of culture.
Asians in general are more focused on their community and family. The US is more focused (over all not specific people) on the self. In the US more people feel entitled to a certain way of life without having to do anything in order to have what they deem pertinent to living. In countries like China, the government doesn’t do anything to take care of the people. They have to work for everything that they have, food, clothing, shelter, transportation. There are no hand outs. There is little technology. It is the blessings of government help and many job opportunities that are often taken for granted in the US. People look down on jobs like factory worker, garbage disposal, grocery store employee, retail etc., when people in third world countries would give anything just to work. Not to mention that the government makes it very difficult for small business to get started and to grow.
I’d rather see smaller government and more humanity on the community level in the US. We all need to stop pointing fingers at each other and start being the change that we want to see in the world.
Josh, I did not say that “taxes are a waste of money”. I said that a large part of the tax money to help the poor is wasted on the huge bureaucracy before it gets to the poor. The Chinese gentleman did not say he was morally obligated, he said he wanted to pay back.
The wealthy pay more in taxes than before.
And if your are going to channel Elizabeth Warren, at least give her credit.
People like you always criticize “rich” people, and you know absolutely NOTHING.
In the U.S., the wealthy pay far more in taxes in ONE YEAR than most people will pay in their lifetimes. And by saying that successful people are not 100% responsible for their success is yet another way to let excuses explain why others are NOT successful.
Yes, a very small percentage of individuals have advantages like no other, but most successful people took advantage of opportunities that everyone has available to them.
How do you explain individuals who have been born without anything and become successful? How do you explain multiple examples of people doing everything they can to get to the U.S. and then building very successful businesses while most who are born here do NOTHING with the same opportunities but will then whine like babies because of “no opportunities”?
Those whiners are the same people who votes for the political thieves who steal from the first group and then waste the money like the other poster said. They should stop being jealous babies and actually DO SOMETHING to earn what they want.
Here’s what would happen with these luxury condos if this situation happened in the U.S….in less than 10 years, they’d be run down and neglected and go right back to being a slum area because the recipients would be ungrateful. They haven’t invested anything to get what was given to them so they don’t appreciate it. So why should they care what happens to it? They don’t. I guarantee they’d complain that somebody should have come in and taken care of the upkeep for them. Because they are infected with the same disease that you have. You don’t really know how the basic concept of economic value works.
Aha ……josh, how much you shared from your income?
The “debt” they are referring to is in the context of a “debt to society” rather than literally owing people money! Also being taxed is no excuse to not give to charity. Everyone who earns money can donate or do something for charity. There is no excuse really.
Alstrum, yes I understand what they meant by debt. The Chinese man does not owe a debt to society. He was gracious and charitable with his own money. And being taxed and regulated too much is a very good reason I do not do more than I do. How can that not make sense? The big slice they take and then spend on the fat bureaucracy leaves a much smaller amount that gets to the needy.
Help for the helpless, not the clueless.
I understand what you are saying. I’m trying to be optimistic about my future after I start earning the “big bucks”. I hope there’s a way to use charity as a tax write-off. I’d like to decide where a portion of my tax dollars go, thank you very much IRS. I don’t want to pay for the fat people, who sit around in (USA) congress getting all the fatter.
Jessica, yes giving to charities is tax deductible. But even that was scaled back by President Obama so that even if you are in the highest tax bracket (39.6%) you can only deduct 28% of your contribution instead of the full 39.6%. And if you make over $200,000 in a year (single) you will pay and extra 0.9% Obamacare tax. And if you make over $200,000 in a year, a tax of 3.8% will be charged on any stock dividend, capital gain, and interest on CD’s, bonds. And the threshold for deducting medical expenses from you taxes increased from 7.5% to 10%, an increase of 33%.
So do not feel guilty for wanting lower taxes or for not giving anything to charity at all. You do not owe anything to anyone or any community. Merely by being a successful person you are doing a mountain of good for society.
Help for the helpless, not the clueless,
Duke
Just Awesome!
karma
Amazing self awareness and gratitude
Im glad seeying this!! What a great person. I would be smiling everyday if it happened to me.
Thank you for this wonderful and inspiring article!
I do know of another very special philanthropist, tho she is not a multimillionaire like Mr. Shuihua, which only demonstrates that we can ALL change somebody’s world, if not their homes! 😉
Her name is Jennifer Gwilliam, she lives in British Columbia, Canada, and has started a movement to help feed Northerners/Inuit, who are facing astronomical food prices in Nunavut – Canada’s newest and most northern territory.
14,000 Canadians have joined her Facebook page (Helping Our Northern Neighbours) and have sent thousands of dollars of food to hungry families in the North.
Jennifer and her team are now moving towards a more sustainable model of the members supporting existing food banks, and helping northerners to establish new ones in villages and hamlets all over the isolated territory.
I love seeing more and more stories like this, more and more investigative reporters who are pursuing these stories for us. From those who are very rich in money to those who are very rich in compassion, we ARE slowly changing the world thanks to these stories.
Thank you, Jeff Roberts!
🙂
the Bill Gates foundation trying to inoculate the world!
If the requirement to take occupancy of one of these wonderfull givings was to have to get immunized for anything…..you could go ahead and give mine to someone else, and thanks for the offer.
Beautiful gesture. But sometimes great intentions go wrong. Did he ask the villagers if they would like to live in what looks like a cold “upgrade”? The prior village looked warm and inviting. I hope he got from the villagers that they actually wanted what they got. Maybe a beautiful town square with free food for life would have been better? It’s hard to say what actually is happening.
Exactly my sentiments, fin!
I have absolutely no complaints against his philanthropic gesture, but I wish he had made the new village more ‘organic’and more warm. The new buildings seem cold, impersonal and regimented. But again. no gripe against his noble gesture.
I highly doubt they cared about the “cold upgrade” with the massive improvement to their standard of living. That’s a bit like someone handing you a $100 bill and you tell them “Well can’t you give me five $20s?” “Warm and inviting” are really just opinions though. We know that their standard of living improved and that he gave some of them free food. For all we know they could have liked the change.`
Justin: I understand your point.
My take is that a non-traditional design turns out to be a headache later on. Modern, utilitarian, concrete designs, though efficient architecturally, tend to fail after exposure to the elements- especially rain and snow. Straight grids always channel the winds and rain through, while curves create quiet spots which make a natural center to the community, like the village common.
Again, as I said- I have no gripes against the man- his benevolence & charity is praiseworthy. And certainly nothing against the villagers- they have desired change, and I can’t argue with that.
I like to assume the opposite. He might have asked them before upgrading it.
Being human means you always want what you don’t have, and never appreciate what you got. You and I perhaps thought the old village looked cozy, roofs can be fixed etc, If given the chance, maybe we would like to reverse some of the doubtful ‘progress’ we have seen where we live today. Then imagine the difference to the villagers recieving modern standard, food for old and poor etc. Of course they ca appreciate that change. Future generations may ask if it was necessary to devastate what now was lost, just like ‘we’ do, but that’s their challenge to deal with. It’s about 50 years in the future Before it comes. Now, should the villagers be better off remaining in cold and draft because of this? Should they suffer now so ‘we’ hipsters could move in later? Or would it ever become ‘hip’ unless it was torn down first? Bottom line is, I suppose, that we shouldn’t aim for control over eachother. ‘We’ cannot build what we want because of regulations that doesn’t allow us to make our own choices, and ‘they’ couldn’t build what they wanted because of resources. Well they were sent an angel. Rejoice. How wonderful it would be if that happened to us, too. Start deserving it and meanwhile, act as it was all up to ourselves.
Totally agree, fin. In fact, I came here today specifically to write a post saying the same thing. These new apartments are very “progressive and modern” but they are very far from nature. Far from nature is exactly where modern culture has poised itself and a large reason why we are destroying nature – we are too removed from it. So much beauty could’ve been given to that little village. Sad. But Wong is right, it was a nice gesture.
Far from nature? How?
I see more trees after the overhaul
Old and New communism, amazing.
learn to pay it forward…
I just hope that the wood on his office or on that dinner table furniture is not exotic. That would taint my perception of him, as rich chinese like him are funding the plundering of the last spots of biodiversity in this planet.
My Traumatic Acquired Brain Injured mentally retarded son who has been falsely imprisoned in solitary confinement for the past 2 years got saved in there and accepted Jesus as his personal Lord and Savior. The problem is that he doesn’t believe God forgave him and that God will miraculously deliver him from false arrest, false imprisonment with full redress, recompense and restoration! As his parents and Guardian/Trustees, we are believing for him for all of the aforementioned prayers. We are believing God will provide him the best lawyer that will stand for the Truth and deliver our son from further exploitation discrimination and victimization at the hands of the authorities and racism.
Most people with this medical condition are suicidal and imprisonment further exacerbates their mental state.
To encourage our son we would be eternally grateful for that.
We have a legal fund to raise fees for a top notch lawyer to bring our son’s plight to justice and begin a class action lawsuit to fruition. The name of the fund is “The Mental Disability Legal Fund for Reuben Phillip”. With this name deposits can be made at any Scotia Bank. Alternatively Interac email checks can be sent to me at “bryanp177@gmail.com”. Thank you for your support for this very precious man and the cause!
His name and address are:
Reuben Phillip
% Prince Albert Correctional Center
Box 3003
Prince Albert Sask
S6V6G1
Maybe you need to send his address to : God- Heaven.
But of course there is no god.