This isn’t about your giving per se, but have your views on the moral valence of financial trading changed in any notable ways since you spoke about this on the 80K podcast?
(I have no reason to think your views have changed, but was reading a socialist/anti-finance critique of EA yesterday and thought of your podcast.)
The episode page lacks a transcript, but does include this summary: “There are arguments both that quant trading is socially useful, and that it is socially harmful. Having investigated these, Alex thinks that it is highly likely to be beneficial for the world.”
In that section (starts around 43:00), you talk about market-making, selling goods “across time” in the way other businesses sell them across space, and generally helping sellers “communicate” by adjusting prices in sensible ways. At the same time, you acknowledge that market-making might be less useful than in the past and that more finance people on the margin might not provide much extra social value (since markets are so fast/advanced/liquid at this point).
This isn’t about your giving per se, but have your views on the moral valence of financial trading changed in any notable ways since you spoke about this on the 80K podcast?
(I have no reason to think your views have changed, but was reading a socialist/anti-finance critique of EA yesterday and thought of your podcast.)
The episode page lacks a transcript, but does include this summary: “There are arguments both that quant trading is socially useful, and that it is socially harmful. Having investigated these, Alex thinks that it is highly likely to be beneficial for the world.”
In that section (starts around 43:00), you talk about market-making, selling goods “across time” in the way other businesses sell them across space, and generally helping sellers “communicate” by adjusting prices in sensible ways. At the same time, you acknowledge that market-making might be less useful than in the past and that more finance people on the margin might not provide much extra social value (since markets are so fast/advanced/liquid at this point).