It’s asking “how much richer would the whole world have to be to make people happier (because richer) by the same amount?”. World GDP is ~$10k/person, so I think $100k means “about as big a welfare boost as giving 100 people a 10% increase in income”.
(This is a legit way of measuring things, but I think arguably it gives the wrong impression compared to the climate numbers, which I think are more directly economic costs, which fall disproportionately on the poor, rather than equivalences. There’s also a decent case that the main reason to care about climate change should be tail risks, which I think aren’t assessed here but could change the conclusion that animal welfare effects are robustly a bigger deal than climate change.)
(1) Determining the “neutral” consumption level, i.e. the level of consumption that (on average) makes a human life on the borderline of worth living. In the base model, this is assumed to be the absolute extreme poverty level of $1.90 per day.
(2) Determining what level of consumption would yield experiences on a par with those of an average factory-farmed animal. In the base model, this is assumed to be below the neutral level (so: a negative existence), specifically $1 per day. Basically a made-up number, but—interestingly—varying this doesn’t make a huge difference to the verdict that beef > chicken so long as you pick a value below the neutral level of consumption.
Question from a friend who isn’t super familiar with EA’s monetization-focused approach to welfare economics:
Anyone feel able to explain this from scratch concisely?
It’s asking “how much richer would the whole world have to be to make people happier (because richer) by the same amount?”. World GDP is ~$10k/person, so I think $100k means “about as big a welfare boost as giving 100 people a 10% increase in income”.
(This is a legit way of measuring things, but I think arguably it gives the wrong impression compared to the climate numbers, which I think are more directly economic costs, which fall disproportionately on the poor, rather than equivalences. There’s also a decent case that the main reason to care about climate change should be tail risks, which I think aren’t assessed here but could change the conclusion that animal welfare effects are robustly a bigger deal than climate change.)
iirc, a couple of the key parameters are:
(1) Determining the “neutral” consumption level, i.e. the level of consumption that (on average) makes a human life on the borderline of worth living. In the base model, this is assumed to be the absolute extreme poverty level of $1.90 per day.
(2) Determining what level of consumption would yield experiences on a par with those of an average factory-farmed animal. In the base model, this is assumed to be below the neutral level (so: a negative existence), specifically $1 per day. Basically a made-up number, but—interestingly—varying this doesn’t make a huge difference to the verdict that beef > chicken so long as you pick a value below the neutral level of consumption.