My reading is that they are seeing the marketing value in matching but philosophically want to have a true match because of the reasons outlined in earlier posts (they don’t consider those campaigns even as “matches”). The ‘true match’ attempt however might seem to be the worst of both worlds...
That being said, I imagine that the average donor towards their “true match” matching funds is actually quite like me: a donor that is seeking to spend specifically on outreach donations. In this case the decision might be between donating to the GiveWell matching pool or something else such as sponsoring a Giving Game, or covering credit card fees, or paying for pizza at an introduction event for students, or an advertising experiment, or a study on psychology of effective giving. In this case it’s definitely counterfactual (it wouldn’t have gone to a GiveWell charity) but it’s not “worse” than they would have otherwise given (they could believe for good reason that incentivising the first donation is sufficiently leveraged that it is better than another outreach focused donation). I can actually understand the psychology of the “true match” donor quite well: I would actually prefer that my donation be held for matching, used for marketing, or returned for me to use in a similar fashion than just go to one of their top charities. This isn’t a typical donor, but it is one that I understand (intimately).
In this case it’s definitely counterfactual (it wouldn’t have gone to a GiveWell charity)
I don’t think that should count as counterfactual, actually. Even though the money would not have gone to a GiveWell charity, it would have done something similarly valuable, so the donor cannot reason that their impact is higher. Compare this to when an employer offers to match $X per person, and doesn’t put any restrictions on what charity you donate to. In the latter case, this really is more impact, and should factor into decisions like “should I be earning to give”.
Ah, yes. In the case of something like “should I be earning to give” that is a very different situation.
There’s two uses of counterfactual here:
Is the total impact triggered by donor A whose donation is being matched by donor B counterfactual once you take into account what donor B would have done otherwise?
Were the actions of donor B counterfactually impacted by donor A (i.e. they would have given somewhere else but that might have been similarly impactful, or less impactful).
In the case of #2 it is not misleading to donor A to say that their donation was matched IMHO. But it isn’t the full story for impact.
(I’d love it if you crossposted that post, but commenting here until then.) I think there’s another category before 9, which is “Donate to a charity not commonly supported by EAs, such as the World Wildlife Fund or Habitat for Humanity.” So this allows for Giving Tuesday to count as counterfactual. I would hope GiveWell’s was of this type (though I sympathize with Luke’s points).
Then we have another question, which is who are these people that are ~indifferent between any EA charity? They’re probably not the first time donors that GiveWell’s targeting.
I think there’s another category before 9, which is “Donate to a charity not commonly supported by EAs, such as the World Wildlife Fund or Habitat for Humanity.”
Yes, I think that’s fine as long as we all agree that the impact of donating to an AA charity is very much higher than donating to one of those charities.
Yeah, very good point!
My reading is that they are seeing the marketing value in matching but philosophically want to have a true match because of the reasons outlined in earlier posts (they don’t consider those campaigns even as “matches”). The ‘true match’ attempt however might seem to be the worst of both worlds...
That being said, I imagine that the average donor towards their “true match” matching funds is actually quite like me: a donor that is seeking to spend specifically on outreach donations. In this case the decision might be between donating to the GiveWell matching pool or something else such as sponsoring a Giving Game, or covering credit card fees, or paying for pizza at an introduction event for students, or an advertising experiment, or a study on psychology of effective giving. In this case it’s definitely counterfactual (it wouldn’t have gone to a GiveWell charity) but it’s not “worse” than they would have otherwise given (they could believe for good reason that incentivising the first donation is sufficiently leveraged that it is better than another outreach focused donation). I can actually understand the psychology of the “true match” donor quite well: I would actually prefer that my donation be held for matching, used for marketing, or returned for me to use in a similar fashion than just go to one of their top charities. This isn’t a typical donor, but it is one that I understand (intimately).
I don’t think that should count as counterfactual, actually. Even though the money would not have gone to a GiveWell charity, it would have done something similarly valuable, so the donor cannot reason that their impact is higher. Compare this to when an employer offers to match $X per person, and doesn’t put any restrictions on what charity you donate to. In the latter case, this really is more impact, and should factor into decisions like “should I be earning to give”.
( I wrote some about this a few years ago, with some discussion: https://www.jefftk.com/p/what-should-counterfactual-donation-mean)
Ah, yes. In the case of something like “should I be earning to give” that is a very different situation.
There’s two uses of counterfactual here:
Is the total impact triggered by donor A whose donation is being matched by donor B counterfactual once you take into account what donor B would have done otherwise?
Were the actions of donor B counterfactually impacted by donor A (i.e. they would have given somewhere else but that might have been similarly impactful, or less impactful).
In the case of #2 it is not misleading to donor A to say that their donation was matched IMHO. But it isn’t the full story for impact.
(I’d love it if you crossposted that post, but commenting here until then.) I think there’s another category before 9, which is “Donate to a charity not commonly supported by EAs, such as the World Wildlife Fund or Habitat for Humanity.” So this allows for Giving Tuesday to count as counterfactual. I would hope GiveWell’s was of this type (though I sympathize with Luke’s points).
Then we have another question, which is who are these people that are ~indifferent between any EA charity? They’re probably not the first time donors that GiveWell’s targeting.
Done! https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/nz2scND85oFyTXTGo/what-should-counterfactual-donation-mean
Yes, I think that’s fine as long as we all agree that the impact of donating to an AA charity is very much higher than donating to one of those charities.