I think the reason I’m publishing it now is because it’s when I’m on vacation! (But yes, that’s a fair point).
To be clear, that’s what I meant to imply—I assumed you published this when you had time, not because the guards were asleep.
I think the timing makes sense for HLI, but given how adverserial the articles come across (to me) it seems like they are trying to shift funding away from [generic top charity] to StrongMinds, which is why it seems to me it’s more about StrongMinds than HLI.
Everything is compared to StrongMinds because that’s what our models currently say is best. When (and I expect it’s only a matter of when) something else takes StrongMinds’ place, we will compare the charities we review to that one. The point is to frame the charities we review in terms of how they compare to our current best bet. I guess this is an alternative to putting everything in terms of GiveDirectly cash transfers—which IMO would generate less heat and light.
Everything is compared to StrongMinds because that’s what our models currently say is best. [...] I guess this is an alternative to putting everything in terms of GiveDirectly cash transfers—which IMO would generate less heat and light.
GW compares everything to GiveDirectly (which isn’t considered their best charity). I like that approach because:
Giving people cash is really easy to understand
It’s high capacity
It’s not a moving target (unlike say worms or betnets which changes all the time based on how the charities are executing)
I think for HLI (at their current stage) everthing is going to be a moving target (because there’s so much uncertainty about the WELLBY effect of every action) but I’d rather have only one moving target rather than two.
FWIW, I’m not unsympathetic to comparing everything to GiveDirectly CTs, and this is probably something we will (continue to) discuss internally at HLI.
To be clear, that’s what I meant to imply—I assumed you published this when you had time, not because the guards were asleep.
Everything is compared to StrongMinds because that’s what our models currently say is best. When (and I expect it’s only a matter of when) something else takes StrongMinds’ place, we will compare the charities we review to that one. The point is to frame the charities we review in terms of how they compare to our current best bet. I guess this is an alternative to putting everything in terms of GiveDirectly cash transfers—which IMO would generate less heat and light.
GW compares everything to GiveDirectly (which isn’t considered their best charity). I like that approach because:
Giving people cash is really easy to understand
It’s high capacity
It’s not a moving target (unlike say worms or betnets which changes all the time based on how the charities are executing)
I think for HLI (at their current stage) everthing is going to be a moving target (because there’s so much uncertainty about the WELLBY effect of every action) but I’d rather have only one moving target rather than two.
FWIW, I’m not unsympathetic to comparing everything to GiveDirectly CTs, and this is probably something we will (continue to) discuss internally at HLI.