More precisely: to what extent is EA a community of elites?
I mean “elite” in the “coastal elite” sense, not in the “extremely good at a certain task” sense.
This comment on the giant EA jobs are really hard to get (a) thread has me pondering...
[Question] Is EA a community of elites?
No comments.
Almost entirely. EA in London is very much targeted at middle-class, cosmopolitan young people. The majority of people I meet at those events have incomes in the 70th to 100th percentiles for the UK, despite being very young. They’re generally well-travelled and usually come from a middle-class background. AFAIK, they exclusively voted ‘remain.’ … What are the other signals of being an elite? I can probably find them in EA London.
I’m a little surprised that this is a question. Do people not know this?
“elite” feels like a fuzzy-enough concept that I’d guess different people have pretty different models of it.
I’m just curious to hear more about what people think around this, given that it’s come up a few times on the giant “EA jobs” thread.
Yeah, that makes sense. Most of the people I know wouldn’t call themselves elite, but I still think it’s broadly true of my EA friends, even though there are other, elite-er people out there.
“Coastal elite” brings to mind often mostly white, politically progressive people from well-to-do backgrounds. Most EAs are white and liberal, and I know a lot of them have gone to elite colleges or top universities. Demographically, they’re similar. There are aspects of EA characterized as elitist, but I can’t think of much else that comes to mind that makes EA clearly the same as the “coastal elite” stereotype. At least, while people may have anecdotes, I can’t think of any more data from the EA community that’s directly relevant.
Hmm… I’d bet that very few EAs voted for Trump, and even fewer would admit to having done so. (Just another dimension for assessing this.)