Interesting! I actually wrote a piece on “the ethics of ‘selling out’” in The Crimson almost 6 years ago (jeez) that was somewhat more explicit in its EA justification, and I’m curious what you make of those arguments.
I think randomly selected Harvard students (among those who have the option to do so) deciding to take high-paying jobs and donate double-digit percentages of their salary to places like GiveWell is very likely better for the world than the random-ish other things they might have done, and for that reason I strongly support this op-ed. But I think for undergrads who are really committed to doing the most good, there are two things I would recommend instead. Both route through developing a solid understanding of the most important and tractable problems in the world, via reading widely, asking good questions of knowledgeable people, doing their own writing and seeking feedback, probably aggressively networking among the people working on these problems.
This enables much more effective earning to give — I think very plugged-in and reasonably informed donors can outperform even top grantmaking organizations in various ways, including helping organizations diversify their funding, moving faster, spotting opportunities that the grantmakers don’t, etc.
And it’s also basically necessary for doing direct work on the world’s most important problems. I think the generic advice to earn to give misses the huge variation in performance between individuals in direct work; if I understand correctly, 80k agrees with this and thinks this should have been much more emphasized in their early writing and advice. Many Harvard students, in my view, could relatively quickly become excellent in roles like think tank research in AI policy or biosecurity or operations at very impactful organizations. A smaller but nontrivial number could be excellent researchers on important philosophical or technical questions. I think it takes a lot of earning potential to beat those.
Wow that’s awesome. Great to connect with a Crimson alum!!
Your article is great — it covers a lot of bases, ones that I wish I had gotten the chance to talk about in my op-ed.
The original version was a lot heavier on the EA-lingo. Discussed 80,000 hours explicitly, didn’t make such a strong claim that “selling out” was the best strategy, etc., but I decided that a straightforward & focused approach to the problem would be most useful.
I don’t think I’d truly say selling out is the “best” thing to do for everyone (which is the language my article uses), and that’s for reasons others have laid out in this comment section.
But I do think it’s a useful nudge. I’ve gotten a lot of reactions like “Wow, these stats are really eye-opening,” and “That’s a cool way to think about selling out,” which was, honestly, the intention, so I’m glad it’s played out that way.
It seems hard to EA-pill everyone from the outset. We all got here in small steps, not with everything thrust at us from once. I’m hopeful that it’s at the very least a good start for a few people :)
Interesting! I actually wrote a piece on “the ethics of ‘selling out’” in The Crimson almost 6 years ago (jeez) that was somewhat more explicit in its EA justification, and I’m curious what you make of those arguments.
I think randomly selected Harvard students (among those who have the option to do so) deciding to take high-paying jobs and donate double-digit percentages of their salary to places like GiveWell is very likely better for the world than the random-ish other things they might have done, and for that reason I strongly support this op-ed. But I think for undergrads who are really committed to doing the most good, there are two things I would recommend instead. Both route through developing a solid understanding of the most important and tractable problems in the world, via reading widely, asking good questions of knowledgeable people, doing their own writing and seeking feedback, probably aggressively networking among the people working on these problems.
This enables much more effective earning to give — I think very plugged-in and reasonably informed donors can outperform even top grantmaking organizations in various ways, including helping organizations diversify their funding, moving faster, spotting opportunities that the grantmakers don’t, etc.
And it’s also basically necessary for doing direct work on the world’s most important problems. I think the generic advice to earn to give misses the huge variation in performance between individuals in direct work; if I understand correctly, 80k agrees with this and thinks this should have been much more emphasized in their early writing and advice. Many Harvard students, in my view, could relatively quickly become excellent in roles like think tank research in AI policy or biosecurity or operations at very impactful organizations. A smaller but nontrivial number could be excellent researchers on important philosophical or technical questions. I think it takes a lot of earning potential to beat those.
Wow that’s awesome. Great to connect with a Crimson alum!!
Your article is great — it covers a lot of bases, ones that I wish I had gotten the chance to talk about in my op-ed.
The original version was a lot heavier on the EA-lingo. Discussed 80,000 hours explicitly, didn’t make such a strong claim that “selling out” was the best strategy, etc., but I decided that a straightforward & focused approach to the problem would be most useful.
I don’t think I’d truly say selling out is the “best” thing to do for everyone (which is the language my article uses), and that’s for reasons others have laid out in this comment section.
But I do think it’s a useful nudge. I’ve gotten a lot of reactions like “Wow, these stats are really eye-opening,” and “That’s a cool way to think about selling out,” which was, honestly, the intention, so I’m glad it’s played out that way.
It seems hard to EA-pill everyone from the outset. We all got here in small steps, not with everything thrust at us from once. I’m hopeful that it’s at the very least a good start for a few people :)