True. But not useful. Salary is a very very very weak signal of impact and a high salary could mean many many other things.
For example here are some things a high salary could also be a signal of, many of which might suggest that following a high salary is NOT a good idea. A high salary might be a sign that:
An org is managing its resources poorly (I know some folk who think their orgs overspend needlessly).
An org is failing to hire, which could be a sign of internal problems or bad management.
An org is more established. Newer orgs may struggle to demonstrate impact so get less funds, but if you buy the value of more entrepreneurship in EA it might be better to find a newer org with a lower salary.
An org is a funding org. Funders tend to pay higher than doers. If you think doers are more needed in EA right now then you shouldn’t follow the salaries to funders
An org is a longtermist org. These tend to pay higher as the existing orgs in the space are not very scalable or good at absorbing funds yet. I think folks should judge cause areas on factors other than salaries.
There would be lower counterfactual impact of taking the job. If you are not salary motivated but think other folk are a higher salary might be a sign that your counterfactual impact will be lower compared to other applicants.
Salary is an extremely messy signal, with many factors affecting it. I would recommend folk in EA do not overly update for or against a job based on its salary.
At least from a personal perspective, if I see an EA job with a super high salary, I sometimes catch myself thinking: the salary is so high, they will definitely find someone for that job, so I would rather work at a less established org that can only offer a lower salary. So my brain sees lower salaries as a signal of higher counterfactual impact. Not sure this is a great way to think (I don’t think folk should judge impact based on salary, and I might just be confabulating to justify my past decision making). But if a fair amount of other folk do think like that then orgs that compete for altruism with high salaries might be shooting themselves in the foot.
This is not at all clear to me. Like, I can process the considerations that you’ve written, but it’s not clear to me that they overweigh the market signal, and I would still lean towards no.
There are other considerations that complicate the analysis. For example, it creates an incentive for grant seekers to request much more money than they need. Someone who is motivated by the expectation of impact and only needs money to cover basic expenses should, other things equal, not be put in a situation where they feel they need to ask for way more money or else create the perception that their work is low value.
+1; higher salary is a hard-to-fake market signal of funders thinking that the job is valuable.
True. But not useful. Salary is a very very very weak signal of impact and a high salary could mean many many other things.
For example here are some things a high salary could also be a signal of, many of which might suggest that following a high salary is NOT a good idea. A high salary might be a sign that:
An org is managing its resources poorly (I know some folk who think their orgs overspend needlessly).
An org is failing to hire, which could be a sign of internal problems or bad management.
An org is more established. Newer orgs may struggle to demonstrate impact so get less funds, but if you buy the value of more entrepreneurship in EA it might be better to find a newer org with a lower salary.
An org is a funding org. Funders tend to pay higher than doers. If you think doers are more needed in EA right now then you shouldn’t follow the salaries to funders
An org is a longtermist org. These tend to pay higher as the existing orgs in the space are not very scalable or good at absorbing funds yet. I think folks should judge cause areas on factors other than salaries.
There would be lower counterfactual impact of taking the job. If you are not salary motivated but think other folk are a higher salary might be a sign that your counterfactual impact will be lower compared to other applicants.
Salary is an extremely messy signal, with many factors affecting it. I would recommend folk in EA do not overly update for or against a job based on its salary.
At least from a personal perspective, if I see an EA job with a super high salary, I sometimes catch myself thinking: the salary is so high, they will definitely find someone for that job, so I would rather work at a less established org that can only offer a lower salary. So my brain sees lower salaries as a signal of higher counterfactual impact. Not sure this is a great way to think (I don’t think folk should judge impact based on salary, and I might just be confabulating to justify my past decision making). But if a fair amount of other folk do think like that then orgs that compete for altruism with high salaries might be shooting themselves in the foot.
Alternatively, the salary is so high because it is difficult to find someone for that job.
This is not at all clear to me. Like, I can process the considerations that you’ve written, but it’s not clear to me that they overweigh the market signal, and I would still lean towards no.
There are other considerations that complicate the analysis. For example, it creates an incentive for grant seekers to request much more money than they need. Someone who is motivated by the expectation of impact and only needs money to cover basic expenses should, other things equal, not be put in a situation where they feel they need to ask for way more money or else create the perception that their work is low value.