This makes a lot of sense generally, but I see one issue that seems potentially significant.
I have a fairly good understanding of what will happen to more cause-area-specific yet “meta” grants in the x-risk/longtermism and animal-welfare domains. The view that the LTFF and AWF are better suited to funding these opportunities seems fairly compelling. The issue I see is that the EA Funds’ Global Health and Development Fund (GHDF) seems to have focused on larger grants to more established organizations; this makes sense given its strong connection to GiveWell’s work. That doesn’t feel like a good fit for opportunities like the ones described by (4) and (5) of your examples of out-of-scope projects. According to its website, GHDF isn’t even accepting applications. Thus, while these sorts of projects are not formally outside of GHDF’s scope—e.g., it has granted to One for the World—it seems that they may be inaccessible as a practical matter.[1]
Perhaps the ideal solution would be for GHDF to start taking applications that would previously have been within EAIF’s scope, so that there is a relatively seamless transition for potential and established grantees. I’m not sure if that is practicable for GHDF, though?
A second possibility would be for EAIF to retain the global-health/development scope for a stated time period, but (for donations received after a specified date in 2024) only out of donor funds that have been designated for that specific scope. That would allow more clarity of scope for EAIF donors while providing a conduit for donors who feel strongly about global-health/development meta work.
Finally, the exit strategy could be slowed down for global health/development specifically, in recognition of the lack of an obvious alternative fund for these sorts of grants. Although exit grants would soften existing grantees’ landing for projects receiving ongoing support, it seems plausible that potential grantees may have done significant groundwork for new projects or expansions based on the funding universe as it existed prior to this plan being made public. Moreover, even if one expects other grantmakers would eventually step in to fill the void, this would likely take time. Thus, 1Q 2024 may be too soon for phasing out the current version of EAIF, at least where global health/development meta activity is concerned.
I’m aware of Open Phil’s work in global health/wellbeing community building, but as you note one of the objectives here is to move toward “a more community-funded model, in contrast to . . . previous reliance on significant institutional donors like Open Phil.” A plan in which Open Phil picks up responsibility for funding these sorts of grants in global health/wellbeing seems like a step backward from this objective.
(own views only) Thank you Jason; I think you’ve correctly nailed the most important (short-term) issue with the changed scope.
I think there are two huge uncertainties with trying to do grants in global health and development meta. The first is that I’m not sure this is what donors want. The second is that I’m not sure there are good grantmakers who are willing to work in this area.
For the first confusion, I don’t have survey results or anything, but I think many GHDF donors will feel betrayed if they learned that a significant fraction of their money goes to funding ambiguously meta activities[1].
I do think GHDF donors with high risk tolerance are currently poorly served by the current ecosystem (and may have to either handpick projects themselves to support, or donate to a meta fund with a large cause split). I don’t have a good sense of how large this population of donors actually is.
For the second confusion, as an empirical matter I believe it’s been difficult to find grantmakers excited about evaluating GHD meta. Even if donors are on board, I don’t think the current EAIF is set up well to do this, nor is the current GHDF.
(In the medium- to long- term, I don’t necessarily expect grantmakers to be a significant bottleneck in itself. Having enough assured funding + us focusing more time on hiring might be enough to solve that problem.)
Longer term, I think it probably makes sense for some fund to do global health and development meta[2] (It might even be under EA Funds!) I just don’t think it’s a good choice right now for either EAIF or GHDF.
I like your exit strategy suggestion and will probably bring it up with the team (note that I don’t have any direct decision-making power for EAIF).
Again, these are just my own views. Caleb and other fund managers might disagree, and provide their own input.
I think many people give to GHDF because they want something that’s maybe 10-20% more risky than GiveWell’s All Grants Fund. Whereas I expect many meta activities, particularly projects with a longer chain of impact than, say, paying for a fundraiser, to be much more risky.
I do think having a non-OP source of funding is good here. In addition to greater independence as you’ve noted, I think OP GHD community building is just quite conservative, e.g. more inclined to fund things with “one step of meta” and clear metrics. For example, fundraisers that counterfactually raise more money than they cost, or incubate GH charities that are on track to become future GiveWell top charities. Whereas I think people should be excited about the types of programs that originally got people like AGB to donate to global health, or fund neglected interventions research, even when the payoffs are not immediate.
I feel pretty good about surveying donors and allocating some proportion of funding based on that. Ultimately, I don’t think it’s low integrity or misleading for us to change directions towards meta work on the GHDF if we are still appealing to the values on our website—though I think the specifics of the arrangement matter a lot.
The main issue (imo) is that it’s unclear that meta GHDF work is competitive with just donating to GiveWell charities. Conversations with Open Phil GHW have made me a bit less enthusiastic about this direction.
What is the ToC for meta Global Health work?
** Find excellent people who can work at existing direct orgs? **
GHD doesn’t seem particularly leveraged career-wise right now. Most career opportunities for people in high-income countries (where EA is most prevalent) seem fairly unexciting (particularly) junior roles. I could imagine mid/late career meta work is pretty exciting, but I haven’t seen many fundable projects in this area. If you are excited about working on mid/late field building in any cause area, please apply to the EAIF!
** Find people who can start new fundraising orgs?**
Open Phil is currently funding projects in this area; EAIF also funds projects in this area (and will continue to do so if they work in multiple cause areas).
** Find people who can start new direct charities?**
I am most compelled by meta work for Animal Welfare, where it seems like new initiatives could beat the best animal interventions we know. To the best of my knowledge, I don’t think that new GHW charities have had much luck beating the best GiveWell charities (by a GiveWell-type view’s lights). Ofc, you could disagree with GiveWell’s worldview; I have some disagreements, though I haven’t seen well-reasoned improvements.
ETA a TL;DR—it may lie in using relatively small amounts of EA funding to counterfactually multiply the positive effect of non-EA resources, or to counterfactually move substantial non-EA funding toward much more effective charities (even if not GiveWell’s best).
What is the ToC for meta Global Health work?
It could lie in a few places. As an example, one could provide very low operational funding to student volunteer-led organizations. Having even a small external budget can be a real force multiplier for a student organization, making existing resources (e.g., student volunteer time, access to campus resources, access to a population reflecting on its values with time to hear a good speaker) significantly more effective.
Drawing on my own life, I went to something like an Oxfam Hunger Banquet as an option toward fulfilling requirements for the freshman seminar class in college. I think that event had a meaningful effect on my own views about effectiveness and global priorities. If one could counterfactually give a similar, even mildly-EA flavored experience to college freshmen for a few dollars each, I speculate that the ROI would be quite good (e.g., in promoting effective giving). That only works if the funding acts as a force multiplier—you’d need many of the inputs to be provided for “free” by non-EA sources. But as in my Hunger Banquet example, I don’t think that is necessarily implausible.
** Find people who can start new direct charities?** . . . . To the best of my knowledge, I don’t think that new GHW charities have had much luck beating the best GiveWell charities (by a GiveWell-type view’s lights).
I don’t think we should assume that the new charities will only donations from EA sources. If a GHW meta grantmaker provides startup funding to a new charity, and as a result that charity ends up diverting $1MM a year from ~ineffective charities to ~0.5X GiveWell work, the value is equivalent to donating ~$500K/year to a GiveWell top charity. Many potential donors are pre-committed to a specific subfield (e.g., mental health), or find diffuse interventions like bednets unappealing for whatever reasons. So their dollars were never in play for GiveWell top charities anyway.
In addition to providing startup funds, one could argue for funding a meta organization that—e.g., -- helps carefully selected 98th-percentile-effectiveness organizations write convincing grant pitches to governments and non-EA foundations. I guess that comes back to force multipliers too—it’s not very effective to fund these organizations’ operating expenses on a long term basis, but the right strategic investments might help them leverage enough non-EA monies to create a really good ROI.
I haven’t come across any good non-EA GHD student groups. Remember that they need to beat the bar of current uni EA groups (that can get funding from Open Phil) from a GHD perspective—which I think is somewhat of a high bar.
If a GHW meta grantmaker provides startup funding to a new charity, and as a result that charity ends up diverting $1MM a year from ~ineffective charities to ~0.5X GiveWell work, the value is equivalent to donating ~$500K/year to a GiveWell top charity.
I don’t think this reasoning checks out. GiveWell interventions also get lots of money from non-EA sources (e.g. AMF). It might be the case that top GiveWell charities are unusually hard to fundraise for from non-EA sources relative to 98% charities, though I’m not sure why that would be the case, and a 98th% intervention could end up being much less cost-effective in real terms.
I’m a grant writer and fundraiser by trade, but in the past I haven’t provided services to any charities that were affiliated with EA or met GiveWell’s effectiveness standards. They’re mostly the typical single-cause, single-location organizations run by people who really mean well but are running on emotion or “faith” alone. These are good people who just aren’t used to using an effective lens, even using much more conventional program evaluation methods.
There’s only so much I can do as an independent worker in this field, but I do like the idea of selecting those 98th percentile orgs you mentioned and am intrigued by the approach of applying a small amount of EA money to them (epistemic status: uncertain, ~40%).
My concern would be that such organizations would only be tangentially aligned with EA values, and so essentially EA Infrastructure would be funding organizations with very different values, which I don’t think matches EA’s core vision.
Of course, I’m still new to the movement, so I don’t really feel all that comfortable speaking definitively about this.
This makes a lot of sense generally, but I see one issue that seems potentially significant.
I have a fairly good understanding of what will happen to more cause-area-specific yet “meta” grants in the x-risk/longtermism and animal-welfare domains. The view that the LTFF and AWF are better suited to funding these opportunities seems fairly compelling. The issue I see is that the EA Funds’ Global Health and Development Fund (GHDF) seems to have focused on larger grants to more established organizations; this makes sense given its strong connection to GiveWell’s work. That doesn’t feel like a good fit for opportunities like the ones described by (4) and (5) of your examples of out-of-scope projects. According to its website, GHDF isn’t even accepting applications. Thus, while these sorts of projects are not formally outside of GHDF’s scope—e.g., it has granted to One for the World—it seems that they may be inaccessible as a practical matter.[1]
Perhaps the ideal solution would be for GHDF to start taking applications that would previously have been within EAIF’s scope, so that there is a relatively seamless transition for potential and established grantees. I’m not sure if that is practicable for GHDF, though?
A second possibility would be for EAIF to retain the global-health/development scope for a stated time period, but (for donations received after a specified date in 2024) only out of donor funds that have been designated for that specific scope. That would allow more clarity of scope for EAIF donors while providing a conduit for donors who feel strongly about global-health/development meta work.
Finally, the exit strategy could be slowed down for global health/development specifically, in recognition of the lack of an obvious alternative fund for these sorts of grants. Although exit grants would soften existing grantees’ landing for projects receiving ongoing support, it seems plausible that potential grantees may have done significant groundwork for new projects or expansions based on the funding universe as it existed prior to this plan being made public. Moreover, even if one expects other grantmakers would eventually step in to fill the void, this would likely take time. Thus, 1Q 2024 may be too soon for phasing out the current version of EAIF, at least where global health/development meta activity is concerned.
I’m aware of Open Phil’s work in global health/wellbeing community building, but as you note one of the objectives here is to move toward “a more community-funded model, in contrast to . . . previous reliance on significant institutional donors like Open Phil.” A plan in which Open Phil picks up responsibility for funding these sorts of grants in global health/wellbeing seems like a step backward from this objective.
(own views only) Thank you Jason; I think you’ve correctly nailed the most important (short-term) issue with the changed scope.
I think there are two huge uncertainties with trying to do grants in global health and development meta. The first is that I’m not sure this is what donors want. The second is that I’m not sure there are good grantmakers who are willing to work in this area.
For the first confusion, I don’t have survey results or anything, but I think many GHDF donors will feel betrayed if they learned that a significant fraction of their money goes to funding ambiguously meta activities[1].
I do think GHDF donors with high risk tolerance are currently poorly served by the current ecosystem (and may have to either handpick projects themselves to support, or donate to a meta fund with a large cause split). I don’t have a good sense of how large this population of donors actually is.
For the second confusion, as an empirical matter I believe it’s been difficult to find grantmakers excited about evaluating GHD meta. Even if donors are on board, I don’t think the current EAIF is set up well to do this, nor is the current GHDF.
(In the medium- to long- term, I don’t necessarily expect grantmakers to be a significant bottleneck in itself. Having enough assured funding + us focusing more time on hiring might be enough to solve that problem.)
Longer term, I think it probably makes sense for some fund to do global health and development meta[2] (It might even be under EA Funds!) I just don’t think it’s a good choice right now for either EAIF or GHDF.
I like your exit strategy suggestion and will probably bring it up with the team (note that I don’t have any direct decision-making power for EAIF).
Again, these are just my own views. Caleb and other fund managers might disagree, and provide their own input.
I think many people give to GHDF because they want something that’s maybe 10-20% more risky than GiveWell’s All Grants Fund. Whereas I expect many meta activities, particularly projects with a longer chain of impact than, say, paying for a fundraiser, to be much more risky.
I do think having a non-OP source of funding is good here. In addition to greater independence as you’ve noted, I think OP GHD community building is just quite conservative, e.g. more inclined to fund things with “one step of meta” and clear metrics. For example, fundraisers that counterfactually raise more money than they cost, or incubate GH charities that are on track to become future GiveWell top charities. Whereas I think people should be excited about the types of programs that originally got people like AGB to donate to global health, or fund neglected interventions research, even when the payoffs are not immediate.
I feel pretty good about surveying donors and allocating some proportion of funding based on that. Ultimately, I don’t think it’s low integrity or misleading for us to change directions towards meta work on the GHDF if we are still appealing to the values on our website—though I think the specifics of the arrangement matter a lot.
The main issue (imo) is that it’s unclear that meta GHDF work is competitive with just donating to GiveWell charities. Conversations with Open Phil GHW have made me a bit less enthusiastic about this direction.
What is the ToC for meta Global Health work?
** Find excellent people who can work at existing direct orgs? ** GHD doesn’t seem particularly leveraged career-wise right now. Most career opportunities for people in high-income countries (where EA is most prevalent) seem fairly unexciting (particularly) junior roles. I could imagine mid/late career meta work is pretty exciting, but I haven’t seen many fundable projects in this area. If you are excited about working on mid/late field building in any cause area, please apply to the EAIF!
** Find people who can start new fundraising orgs?** Open Phil is currently funding projects in this area; EAIF also funds projects in this area (and will continue to do so if they work in multiple cause areas).
** Find people who can start new direct charities?** I am most compelled by meta work for Animal Welfare, where it seems like new initiatives could beat the best animal interventions we know. To the best of my knowledge, I don’t think that new GHW charities have had much luck beating the best GiveWell charities (by a GiveWell-type view’s lights). Ofc, you could disagree with GiveWell’s worldview; I have some disagreements, though I haven’t seen well-reasoned improvements.
(Epistemic status: speculative)
ETA a TL;DR—it may lie in using relatively small amounts of EA funding to counterfactually multiply the positive effect of non-EA resources, or to counterfactually move substantial non-EA funding toward much more effective charities (even if not GiveWell’s best).
It could lie in a few places. As an example, one could provide very low operational funding to student volunteer-led organizations. Having even a small external budget can be a real force multiplier for a student organization, making existing resources (e.g., student volunteer time, access to campus resources, access to a population reflecting on its values with time to hear a good speaker) significantly more effective.
Drawing on my own life, I went to something like an Oxfam Hunger Banquet as an option toward fulfilling requirements for the freshman seminar class in college. I think that event had a meaningful effect on my own views about effectiveness and global priorities. If one could counterfactually give a similar, even mildly-EA flavored experience to college freshmen for a few dollars each, I speculate that the ROI would be quite good (e.g., in promoting effective giving). That only works if the funding acts as a force multiplier—you’d need many of the inputs to be provided for “free” by non-EA sources. But as in my Hunger Banquet example, I don’t think that is necessarily implausible.
I don’t think we should assume that the new charities will only donations from EA sources. If a GHW meta grantmaker provides startup funding to a new charity, and as a result that charity ends up diverting $1MM a year from ~ineffective charities to ~0.5X GiveWell work, the value is equivalent to donating ~$500K/year to a GiveWell top charity. Many potential donors are pre-committed to a specific subfield (e.g., mental health), or find diffuse interventions like bednets unappealing for whatever reasons. So their dollars were never in play for GiveWell top charities anyway.
In addition to providing startup funds, one could argue for funding a meta organization that—e.g., -- helps carefully selected 98th-percentile-effectiveness organizations write convincing grant pitches to governments and non-EA foundations. I guess that comes back to force multipliers too—it’s not very effective to fund these organizations’ operating expenses on a long term basis, but the right strategic investments might help them leverage enough non-EA monies to create a really good ROI.
I haven’t come across any good non-EA GHD student groups. Remember that they need to beat the bar of current uni EA groups (that can get funding from Open Phil) from a GHD perspective—which I think is somewhat of a high bar.
I don’t think this reasoning checks out. GiveWell interventions also get lots of money from non-EA sources (e.g. AMF). It might be the case that top GiveWell charities are unusually hard to fundraise for from non-EA sources relative to 98% charities, though I’m not sure why that would be the case, and a 98th% intervention could end up being much less cost-effective in real terms.
I’m a grant writer and fundraiser by trade, but in the past I haven’t provided services to any charities that were affiliated with EA or met GiveWell’s effectiveness standards. They’re mostly the typical single-cause, single-location organizations run by people who really mean well but are running on emotion or “faith” alone. These are good people who just aren’t used to using an effective lens, even using much more conventional program evaluation methods.
There’s only so much I can do as an independent worker in this field, but I do like the idea of selecting those 98th percentile orgs you mentioned and am intrigued by the approach of applying a small amount of EA money to them (epistemic status: uncertain, ~40%).
My concern would be that such organizations would only be tangentially aligned with EA values, and so essentially EA Infrastructure would be funding organizations with very different values, which I don’t think matches EA’s core vision.
Of course, I’m still new to the movement, so I don’t really feel all that comfortable speaking definitively about this.
Nice points on GHDF, Jason! I will publish a related post in the next few days following up of this comment I made recently. Update: published!