I think one large argument against what you’re saying is that spending/direct work attracts more people to the movement (some of which will do E2G), and might even have a higher ROI just looking at the movement’s financials than investing/E2G (this argument comes from Owen here).
Also, since there are so few people now in a position to do direct work, it seems like the value of a marginal person doing so is quite high, and much higher than the equivalent labor of the marginal person to do EA-funded work in the future once we’ve figured out how to scale up our spending to billions of dollars per year.
I think one large argument against what you’re saying is that spending/direct work attracts more people to the movement (some of which will do E2G), and might even have a higher ROI just looking at the movement’s financials than investing/E2G (this argument comes from Owen here).
Also, since there are so few people now in a position to do direct work, it seems like the value of a marginal person doing so is quite high, and much higher than the equivalent labor of the marginal person to do EA-funded work in the future once we’ve figured out how to scale up our spending to billions of dollars per year.