Hi Alex. It’s a great idea to have this AMA! Hopefully it helps raise more awareness of earning to give as a potential path to impact for more people.
Two questions that I’d be keen to get your views on, and which may be of interest to the community:
(1) How do you balance your earning to give/​effective giving commitments with your family commitments? (e.g. in my own experience, one’s partner may disapprove of or be stressed out by you giving >=10%, and of course with a mortgage/​kids things get even tougher)
(2) Would you say currently, the median EA should consider trying some E2G (or at least non-EA work while giving significantly) early on in their career?
The main considerations, as far as I see, relate to: (a) the EA labour market (where currently, demand for jobs outstrip supply—so chances of landing a job are low & counterfactual impact relative to next best hire is small); (b) whether money is the bottleneck for EA (it does seem so, at least for GHD/​AW—and importantly, you can’t always choose to work at the most effective charities but can choose to donate to them); and (c) miscellaneous issues like financial stability, building career capital, and ability to switch career paths (traditional work in finance/​consulting/​tech for 1-3 years of E2G seem to be stronger on all three counts, relative to the marginal EA job that a fresh grad is likely to land)
Hi Alex. It’s a great idea to have this AMA! Hopefully it helps raise more awareness of earning to give as a potential path to impact for more people.
Two questions that I’d be keen to get your views on, and which may be of interest to the community:
(1) How do you balance your earning to give/​effective giving commitments with your family commitments? (e.g. in my own experience, one’s partner may disapprove of or be stressed out by you giving >=10%, and of course with a mortgage/​kids things get even tougher)
(2) Would you say currently, the median EA should consider trying some E2G (or at least non-EA work while giving significantly) early on in their career?
The main considerations, as far as I see, relate to: (a) the EA labour market (where currently, demand for jobs outstrip supply—so chances of landing a job are low & counterfactual impact relative to next best hire is small); (b) whether money is the bottleneck for EA (it does seem so, at least for GHD/​AW—and importantly, you can’t always choose to work at the most effective charities but can choose to donate to them); and (c) miscellaneous issues like financial stability, building career capital, and ability to switch career paths (traditional work in finance/​consulting/​tech for 1-3 years of E2G seem to be stronger on all three counts, relative to the marginal EA job that a fresh grad is likely to land)
Cheers,
Joel