probability_get_any_job depends a lot on the person. Also note that if you attempt to do grantmaking but don’t get a job, you still get most of the impact of your default career. So the “try to do grantmaking” action is worth a lot more than P(become a grantmaker)*EV(grantmaking).
I suspect that usd_per_basis_point_xrisk is doing a lot of work, and different people will have pretty different beliefs about it, and maybe in particular the best grants are extremely likely to be made without the marginal grantmaker.
Probability of getting any Open Philanthropy-equivalent job
probability_get_any_job depends a lot on the person.
Totally agree! For reference, here’s what impact looks like if you set probability_get_any_job to 0.01
or 0.3
Broader value due to trying for grantmaking jobs
note that if you attempt to do grantmaking but don’t get a job, you still get most of the impact of your default career. So the “try to do grantmaking” action is worth a lot more than P(become a grantmaker)*EV(grantmaking).
Yes! This is what I am trying to get at by: “There might be over- or under-counting issues. For instance, I guess that the average number of years employed will be 11. This corresponds to me excluding the impact of the grantmaker’s post-grantmaking career from my definition of career path.” But modeling out the value of career paths attempted instead and their respective probabilities sounds awful :P
Should be fine as long as you don’t (1) compare different career paths using very dissimilar career path lengths, and (2) think exit options have different EV ex ante, conditional on the person’s characteristics. (2) looks fishy—I’m sure there’s much room for improvement there.
Sensitivity to $/x-risk basis point
I suspect that usd_per_basis_point_xrisk is doing a lot of work, and different people will have pretty different beliefs about it
Agree again! Although I am more pessimistic! I think that we can’t disagree about this parameter by much more than 1 order of magnitude, whereas there might be other parameters that have even wider scope for disagreement (or error).
For reference, here’s what impact looks like if you set usd_per_basis_point_xrisk to 100M
I guess my preferred solution to the probability_get_any_job issue is generally to just effectively set it to 1. That way you can answer the question “impact of a grantmaker” rather than “impact of trying to be a grantmaker,” and the counterfactual impact of trying to become a grantmaker is P(become a grantmaker)*EV(grantmaking) with opportunity cost depending on your circumstances.
Good post (I think, without checking numbers).
probability_get_any_job depends a lot on the person. Also note that if you attempt to do grantmaking but don’t get a job, you still get most of the impact of your default career. So the “try to do grantmaking” action is worth a lot more than P(become a grantmaker)*EV(grantmaking).
I suspect that usd_per_basis_point_xrisk is doing a lot of work, and different people will have pretty different beliefs about it, and maybe in particular the best grants are extremely likely to be made without the marginal grantmaker.
Thank you! On your points:
Probability of getting any Open Philanthropy-equivalent job
Totally agree! For reference, here’s what impact looks like if you set
probability_get_any_jobto 0.01or 0.3
Broader value due to trying for grantmaking jobs
Yes! This is what I am trying to get at by: “There might be over- or under-counting issues. For instance, I guess that the average number of years employed will be 11. This corresponds to me excluding the impact of the grantmaker’s post-grantmaking career from my definition of career path.” But modeling out the value of career paths attempted instead and their respective probabilities sounds awful :P
Should be fine as long as you don’t (1) compare different career paths using very dissimilar career path lengths, and (2) think exit options have different EV ex ante, conditional on the person’s characteristics. (2) looks fishy—I’m sure there’s much room for improvement there.
Sensitivity to $/x-risk basis point
Agree again! Although I am more pessimistic! I think that we can’t disagree about this parameter by much more than 1 order of magnitude, whereas there might be other parameters that have even wider scope for disagreement (or error).
For reference, here’s what impact looks like if you set
usd_per_basis_point_xriskto 100Mor 1B
I guess my preferred solution to the probability_get_any_job issue is generally to just effectively set it to 1. That way you can answer the question “impact of a grantmaker” rather than “impact of trying to be a grantmaker,” and the counterfactual impact of trying to become a grantmaker is P(become a grantmaker)*EV(grantmaking) with opportunity cost depending on your circumstances.
Makes sense! Would add another 0.5 orders of magnitude vs. the unconditional estimate, so ~2 x-risk basis points.