On the funding side, you’d need to consider that marginal increases in funding likely enables cases with lower expected impact generally, and that funding more anti-carbon work may trigger funging of non-EA resources toward other types of environmental work that might be less effective.
Agree that marginal increases have lower impact. I assume GiveWell-style research on the inner workings of the organization would be needed to see if funding efficacy is actually currently comparable to AMF, and I don’t presume to have that level of know-how. I’m just hoping to bring more attention to this area.
What tools are used to assess likely funging? Is a large deficit as % of operating costs a sign that funging would be relatively low, or are most organizations that don’t have the explicit goal of continuing to scale assumed to have very high funging costs of say 50% or higher?
I think it’s more art than science. You’ve got two issues here—funging within Earthjustice (after receiving a big restricted donation, they will probably spend fewer unrestricted funds on stuff we think is high-impact) and funging by other Earthjustice donors. I think the more important factor for the former is often how much unrestricted funding was going into the activity we like.
On the funding side, you’d need to consider that marginal increases in funding likely enables cases with lower expected impact generally, and that funding more anti-carbon work may trigger funging of non-EA resources toward other types of environmental work that might be less effective.
Hi Jason, thanks for the response.
Agree that marginal increases have lower impact. I assume GiveWell-style research on the inner workings of the organization would be needed to see if funding efficacy is actually currently comparable to AMF, and I don’t presume to have that level of know-how. I’m just hoping to bring more attention to this area.
What tools are used to assess likely funging? Is a large deficit as % of operating costs a sign that funging would be relatively low, or are most organizations that don’t have the explicit goal of continuing to scale assumed to have very high funging costs of say 50% or higher?
I think it’s more art than science. You’ve got two issues here—funging within Earthjustice (after receiving a big restricted donation, they will probably spend fewer unrestricted funds on stuff we think is high-impact) and funging by other Earthjustice donors. I think the more important factor for the former is often how much unrestricted funding was going into the activity we like.