They definitely have a much smaller weight than what I first assumed: I initially thought all GiveWell did was to make cost-effectiveness analyses of dozens of charities and recommend the most cost-effective ones. It seems that’s completely wrong, and they rely a lot on other criteria and less quantitative or public information.
I think GiveWell actually puts a major weight on their cost-effectiveness analyses. Elie Hassenfeld (co-founder and CEO of GiveWell) mentioned in the Clearer Thinking podcast that (emphasis mine):
ELIE: You know, there’s a lot of attention paid to the numbers, and certainly plenty of high profile institutions were behind the report. I think that, in my experience, GiveWell is one of the few institutions that’s, I don’t know, trying to make decisions based on cost-effectiveness analysis in doing that in a sort of, consistent and principled way. GiveWell cost- effectiveness estimates are not the only input into our decisions to fund malaria programs and deworming programs, there are some other factors, but they’re certainly 80% plus of the case. I think we’re relatively unique in that way. I don’t think there are other groups, certainly I can’t think of any ones as I’m sitting here now, that are using numbers in that same way. In some ways, I think that is why we have real value added in the world, because I don’t think that explicit cost-effectiveness estimates is the only way to give effectively, but it’s certainly a strategy that I think should be employed significantly. I’m glad that we can be the ones to come in and play it.
Hi Lorenzo,
I think GiveWell actually puts a major weight on their cost-effectiveness analyses. Elie Hassenfeld (co-founder and CEO of GiveWell) mentioned in the Clearer Thinking podcast that (emphasis mine):