The bonus WILL in part go their favorite charity, as you can see when you step through the donation process ⌠This is true of Giving Multiplier as well.
I agree that the site gives the impression that part of the bonus goes to the favorite charity, but that isnât usefully true. I explain this in detail in my GivingMultiplier post, and summarize it as âA simpler way to describe this is that it matches whatever portion you choose to give to the effective charity at 50%, and doesnât match your donation to the other charity at allâ. [EDIT: the FarmKind function is a bit more complex here, sometimes above 50% and sometimes below, but the matched portion to the non-effective charity remains 0%] To take the screenshot case, I think it would be much clearer to describe it to donors as the donor putting $150, of which $90 goes to the favorite charity and $60 to the effective charity, and then FarmKind contributes $30 to the effective charity.
It is not the case that all bonus funds would otherwise go to help animals. We fundraise for our bonus fund from the same donor pool as our regular donors âŚ
First, the post weâre discussing this on is a counterexample. FarmKind is fundraising from EAs, and writes âIf youâre reading this post, our platform isnât aimed at you. ⌠you may be interested in giving to them via our bonus fundâ. That is, FarmKind does not want EAs (or other people who already plan to give to help animals effectively) to give through the matching platform, but does want them to give to the bonus pool.
Second, I was trying to make a more limited claim, about what happens to the money thatâs already been put in the bonus pool. I think we can agree that every dollar donated to the bonus pool is one that will be paid out to effective animal charities regardless of how other donors behave?
On your first point, your way of describing things may or may not be clearer, but itâs not accurate. See my response to Ben Milwood about how the money flows. You may see the two scenarios as being the same in effect, but in that case our comms are equally accurate in describing the effect and more accurate in describing the money flows. Weâve chosen what we believe to be the most clear, intuitive and compelling way to explain things.
On the first part of your second point, yesâsome bonus funding money would have otherwise been given to help animals (like anyone convinced by this post), while other bonus funding money (and so far the majority) wouldnât have. So it is not the case that all bonus funds would otherwise go to help animals, which your original critique suggested was the case. Thatâs what I wanted to correct the claim.
Regarding your more limited claim, I donât agree that âevery dollar donated to the bonus pool is one that will be paid out to effective animal charities regardless of how other donors behaveâ because dollars in the fund very literally get paid out to favorite charities that neednât be super-effective or support animals.
Plus, when thinking about the counterfactual impact of the bonus system, I think whatâs relevant is what would have happened to those dollars if the fund didnât existânot just what would have happened to them once already in the bonus fund. As explained, many donations to the bonus fund would not have been donated at all were it not for the fund or would not have gone to effective animal charities. And were it not for regulator donors generating demand for bonus funding, we could not fundraise for the bonus fund. The two groups of donors incentivise one another to donate and lead to more total donations to effective farmed animal charities than if the system did not exist. We explain this in our comms. I believe that how our system works is in keeping with the spirit of even the most naive interpretation, in that, whether youâre a regular or bonus donor, your participation in the system leads to more money being donated than would have occurred otherwise.
Itâs fair enough that you would have chosen to communicate things differently in our position. Thank you for giving the system some thought and voicing your perspective on how you would choose to communicate things! Itâs helpful for us to consider such perspectives as we continuously improve our platform.
Maybe it would be most productive to focus on this limited point:
I donât agree that âevery dollar donated to the bonus pool is one that will be paid out to effective animal charities regardless of how other donors behaveâ because dollars in the fund very literally get paid out to favorite charities that neednât be super-effective or support animals.
Lets say I came to you with an offer. I have a pot of money with $100 in it. If you do nothing Iâm going to donate it to ACE at the end of the day. If youâre willing to donate $50 to ACE, however, then Iâm willing to give you $25 from the pot and only the remaining $75 from the pot will go to ACE.
(This offer is not intended to be fully analogous to the FarmKind situation, but to be a simplified version where your âvery literally get paid outâ defense still applies.)
The net flow of money if you donât take the offer is: $100 leaves the pot, ACE gets $100. The net flow if you do take the offer is: $100 leaves the pot, $25 leaves your bank account, ACE gets $125.
Do you think that in the simplified case itâs fair for me to say that I donât agree that âevery dollar in the pot will be paid out to ACE regardless of how you behaveâ because $25 from the pot will very literally be transferred to your bank account?
Similarly, it seems to me that the most straightforward way to describe the flows of money if you take the offer is âThe pot will transfer $100 to ACE regardless, and you will additionally transfer $25â. My original presentation of the offer, with the idea that some money goes from the pot to your bank account, is adding additional complexity that only serves to make the situation more confusing and potentially convince people to take the offer because they havenât fully thought the situation through.
I agree with your interpretation of this case (except for what the most straightforward way to describe it is), but you seem to be missing the broader point about the interplay between supply and demand for matching funding which means that both groups play a causal role in increasing donations to the favorite and super-effective charities alike. I understand you think the way weâve communicated this is misleading, not in the spirit of EA or otherwise wrong. This is a valuable perspective, for which I thank you, but we respectfully disagree.
I hope what we do now agree on is that, regarding your comment âthe site gives the impression that part of the bonus goes to the favorite charity, but that isnât usefully trueâ, it IS true that part of the bonus goes to the favorite charity.
Thatâs all the time I have to spend on this topic. I hope to have clarified some of the facts about how the platform works.
Iâm taking your response to be saying that âpart of the pot goes to your bank accountâ is a fair way to characterize my example offer, but if Iâve misinterpreted your response let me know?
No I donât think âpart of the pot goes to your accountâ is a fair way to characterize your offer. I think you may have edited your comment as I was responding to it.
Itâs clear we agree on what would have otherwise happened to the money already in the bonus fund at the time of a regular donation. I donât think we need a hypothetical example to dig into that any further. Itâs also clear what we disagree on (please see other comments so I donât have to state it again). I donât aim to change your mind on those points, and so Iâll leave things there :)
Hmm, then Iâm still confused about why you think this is a fair way to characterize what FarmKind is doing, but not what my offer does. Iâm trying to break it down by looking at a simplified case, which is why I think the hypothetical helps?
(While I did edit my comment, it was to add the final paragraph, starting with Similarly.... Iâm pretty sure the Do you think that in the simplified case it's fair for me to say... was in there from the beginning.)
(FWIW, it looks like FarmKind doesnât do the exact same matching as GivingMultiplier, and the relationship between bonus size and allocation percentage isnât linear, but it is still always true that the bonus is less than the amount allocated to the effective charity, which is the condition that matters for your argument.)
Good point, thanks for flagging! Hereâs what the function looks like to me (sheet):
Note that the X-axis is in terms of the fraction of the donorâs contribution actually going to the effective charity, and not in terms of the percentages displayed in the tool. For example, when you set the tool to â10%â and put in $1000 it tells you $105 will go to the effective charity and $945 will go to the regular charity. That means $55 of the donorâs initial $1000 is going to the effective charity, for a rate of 5.5%, and that is the value I use on the x-axis.
(Part of why I missed this is that the screenshot Aidan provided happens to show the only case where FarmKind and GivingMultiplier function identically)
Thanks for the response!
I agree that the site gives the impression that part of the bonus goes to the favorite charity, but that isnât usefully true. I explain this in detail in my GivingMultiplier post, and summarize it as âA simpler way to describe this is that it matches whatever portion you choose to give to the effective charity at 50%, and doesnât match your donation to the other charity at allâ. [EDIT: the FarmKind function is a bit more complex here, sometimes above 50% and sometimes below, but the matched portion to the non-effective charity remains 0%] To take the screenshot case, I think it would be much clearer to describe it to donors as the donor putting $150, of which $90 goes to the favorite charity and $60 to the effective charity, and then FarmKind contributes $30 to the effective charity.
First, the post weâre discussing this on is a counterexample. FarmKind is fundraising from EAs, and writes âIf youâre reading this post, our platform isnât aimed at you. ⌠you may be interested in giving to them via our bonus fundâ. That is, FarmKind does not want EAs (or other people who already plan to give to help animals effectively) to give through the matching platform, but does want them to give to the bonus pool.
Second, I was trying to make a more limited claim, about what happens to the money thatâs already been put in the bonus pool. I think we can agree that every dollar donated to the bonus pool is one that will be paid out to effective animal charities regardless of how other donors behave?
On your first point, your way of describing things may or may not be clearer, but itâs not accurate. See my response to Ben Milwood about how the money flows. You may see the two scenarios as being the same in effect, but in that case our comms are equally accurate in describing the effect and more accurate in describing the money flows. Weâve chosen what we believe to be the most clear, intuitive and compelling way to explain things.
On the first part of your second point, yesâsome bonus funding money would have otherwise been given to help animals (like anyone convinced by this post), while other bonus funding money (and so far the majority) wouldnât have. So it is not the case that all bonus funds would otherwise go to help animals, which your original critique suggested was the case. Thatâs what I wanted to correct the claim.
Regarding your more limited claim, I donât agree that âevery dollar donated to the bonus pool is one that will be paid out to effective animal charities regardless of how other donors behaveâ because dollars in the fund very literally get paid out to favorite charities that neednât be super-effective or support animals.
Plus, when thinking about the counterfactual impact of the bonus system, I think whatâs relevant is what would have happened to those dollars if the fund didnât existânot just what would have happened to them once already in the bonus fund. As explained, many donations to the bonus fund would not have been donated at all were it not for the fund or would not have gone to effective animal charities. And were it not for regulator donors generating demand for bonus funding, we could not fundraise for the bonus fund. The two groups of donors incentivise one another to donate and lead to more total donations to effective farmed animal charities than if the system did not exist. We explain this in our comms. I believe that how our system works is in keeping with the spirit of even the most naive interpretation, in that, whether youâre a regular or bonus donor, your participation in the system leads to more money being donated than would have occurred otherwise.
Itâs fair enough that you would have chosen to communicate things differently in our position. Thank you for giving the system some thought and voicing your perspective on how you would choose to communicate things! Itâs helpful for us to consider such perspectives as we continuously improve our platform.
Maybe it would be most productive to focus on this limited point:
Lets say I came to you with an offer. I have a pot of money with $100 in it. If you do nothing Iâm going to donate it to ACE at the end of the day. If youâre willing to donate $50 to ACE, however, then Iâm willing to give you $25 from the pot and only the remaining $75 from the pot will go to ACE.
(This offer is not intended to be fully analogous to the FarmKind situation, but to be a simplified version where your âvery literally get paid outâ defense still applies.)
The net flow of money if you donât take the offer is: $100 leaves the pot, ACE gets $100. The net flow if you do take the offer is: $100 leaves the pot, $25 leaves your bank account, ACE gets $125.
Do you think that in the simplified case itâs fair for me to say that I donât agree that âevery dollar in the pot will be paid out to ACE regardless of how you behaveâ because $25 from the pot will very literally be transferred to your bank account?
Similarly, it seems to me that the most straightforward way to describe the flows of money if you take the offer is âThe pot will transfer $100 to ACE regardless, and you will additionally transfer $25â. My original presentation of the offer, with the idea that some money goes from the pot to your bank account, is adding additional complexity that only serves to make the situation more confusing and potentially convince people to take the offer because they havenât fully thought the situation through.
I agree with your interpretation of this case (except for what the most straightforward way to describe it is), but you seem to be missing the broader point about the interplay between supply and demand for matching funding which means that both groups play a causal role in increasing donations to the favorite and super-effective charities alike. I understand you think the way weâve communicated this is misleading, not in the spirit of EA or otherwise wrong. This is a valuable perspective, for which I thank you, but we respectfully disagree.
I hope what we do now agree on is that, regarding your comment âthe site gives the impression that part of the bonus goes to the favorite charity, but that isnât usefully trueâ, it IS true that part of the bonus goes to the favorite charity.
Thatâs all the time I have to spend on this topic. I hope to have clarified some of the facts about how the platform works.
Thanks for the responses!
Iâm taking your response to be saying that âpart of the pot goes to your bank accountâ is a fair way to characterize my example offer, but if Iâve misinterpreted your response let me know?
No I donât think âpart of the pot goes to your accountâ is a fair way to characterize your offer. I think you may have edited your comment as I was responding to it.
Itâs clear we agree on what would have otherwise happened to the money already in the bonus fund at the time of a regular donation. I donât think we need a hypothetical example to dig into that any further. Itâs also clear what we disagree on (please see other comments so I donât have to state it again). I donât aim to change your mind on those points, and so Iâll leave things there :)
Hmm, then Iâm still confused about why you think this is a fair way to characterize what FarmKind is doing, but not what my offer does. Iâm trying to break it down by looking at a simplified case, which is why I think the hypothetical helps?
(While I did edit my comment, it was to add the final paragraph, starting with
Similarly.... Iâm pretty sure theDo you think that in the simplified case it's fair for me to say...was in there from the beginning.)(FWIW, it looks like FarmKind doesnât do the exact same matching as GivingMultiplier, and the relationship between bonus size and allocation percentage isnât linear, but it is still always true that the bonus is less than the amount allocated to the effective charity, which is the condition that matters for your argument.)
Good point, thanks for flagging! Hereâs what the function looks like to me (sheet):
Note that the X-axis is in terms of the fraction of the donorâs contribution actually going to the effective charity, and not in terms of the percentages displayed in the tool. For example, when you set the tool to â10%â and put in $1000 it tells you $105 will go to the effective charity and $945 will go to the regular charity. That means $55 of the donorâs initial $1000 is going to the effective charity, for a rate of 5.5%, and that is the value I use on the x-axis.
(Part of why I missed this is that the screenshot Aidan provided happens to show the only case where FarmKind and GivingMultiplier function identically)