How is the economic downturn affecting the Rockefeller Foundation?
Judith Rodin: Nobody foresaw the magnitude of the economic crisis or the rapidity with which it occurred. Our endowment was down somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 percent at the end of ’08. And we will, undoubtedly, be well over our traditional 5 percent payout this year. But our investment managers were attentive to the market turbulence, and in early 2008 we took out a sizable line of credit with a large bank. With access to that money, we did not have to sell our holdings into a declining market to meet our grantmaking needs. We plan to honor all of our approved grants and move forward with all of our ongoing initiatives. The Rockefeller Foundation has been around for more than 90 years, and with the confidence of that history we’re well positioned to weather this financial crisis. What lessons did the foundation learn from going through the Great Depression? Just as the federal government saw the opportunity to initiate major programs during that time of need, so too did the Rock
