Harvard Professor John Campbell defines an endowment as “a promise of vigorous immortality”. We think he means the endowment should be able to fulfill its mission indefinitely into the future: spending shouldn’t be so profligate that the capital will be exhausted in one generation, nor so miserly that nothing is accomplished and capital accumulation becomes an end in itself.
How much is just right? This calculator is designed to help endowment investors come to a sensible conclusion.