Two other paths that might be unusually impactful for EA software engineers:
Joining a for-profit startup with a) EA founders, b) a small engineering team, and c) where engineering appears critical to the organization’s success.
The “EA founder” part of this isn’t strictly necessary, but this makes it much more likely that a great software engineer can create a lot of value through generating future donations (if we expect much of the equity to be captured by founders and investors).
Note that because EA isn’t very funding-constrained, your bar for this might be very high, like ~$millions/year in expectation per new engineer.
I think it’s plausibly really good to have EA engineers in positions that’d be close to the AI leadership at top tech companies in 5-15 years.
Note that I think most software folks who are in a position to do so should not do this, partially for reasons outlined here. The people who are best at it are a) comparatively good at climbing prestige ladders and b) agenty enough to spot great opportunities for impact and c) act upon them.
This also has obvious downside risks (e.g. via speeding up AI timelines slightly).
And also I’m more than a bit worried about motivated cognition causing people to overrate the value (and/or be wrong about the sign) of the direct impact of working technically interesting and cushy BigTech jobs.
Still, right now this appears to be a very underrated path, and the case for it at least naively seems reasonable.
Two other paths that might be unusually impactful for EA software engineers:
Joining a for-profit startup with a) EA founders, b) a small engineering team, and c) where engineering appears critical to the organization’s success.
The “EA founder” part of this isn’t strictly necessary, but this makes it much more likely that a great software engineer can create a lot of value through generating future donations (if we expect much of the equity to be captured by founders and investors).
Note that because EA isn’t very funding-constrained, your bar for this might be very high, like ~$millions/year in expectation per new engineer.
Personally, I think FTX, Alameda Research, and Lantern Ventures are over this bar.
(COI disclaimer: I have multiple personal financial ties here, including via the FTX EA fellowship)
I would not be surprised if several others exist in the space that I’m not personally aware of.
Ladder climbing within AI labs at large tech companies.
I think it’s plausibly really good to have EA engineers in positions that’d be close to the AI leadership at top tech companies in 5-15 years.
Note that I think most software folks who are in a position to do so should not do this, partially for reasons outlined here. The people who are best at it are a) comparatively good at climbing prestige ladders and b) agenty enough to spot great opportunities for impact and c) act upon them.
This also has obvious downside risks (e.g. via speeding up AI timelines slightly).
And also I’m more than a bit worried about motivated cognition causing people to overrate the value (and/or be wrong about the sign) of the direct impact of working technically interesting and cushy BigTech jobs.
Still, right now this appears to be a very underrated path, and the case for it at least naively seems reasonable.