So I think the state of affairs right now for some key work is “barely funding constrained at all”. I think that’s helpful to be able to talk about, and it doesn’t seem egregious to me if people round it off as “not funding constrained”. But I’m worried that that has more (incorrect) connotations of “extra money isn’t helpful” than “funding overhang”.
The issue is that we need to be able to talk about two different things:
The value of deploying funding now for getting marginal work to happen right now;
The all-things-considered value of funding.
These are obviously related, but they can vary separately. I want to be able to express that #1 is very low (where it’s unproblematic if people approximate it as zero), but I’m definitely not OK with people approximating #2 as zero. In a different world #1 could be high while #2 was relatively low (in this case borrowing-to-give would be a good strategy).
[A very rough figure I’d be OK with people using for #2 is 100 nanodooms averted /$M (for funding that isn’t significantly correlated with other future EA funding sources; lower if correlated).]
I’m now noticing I’m unsure whether you disagree that it’s okay to approximate #1 as zero. I read your post as arguing against approximating #2 as zero, but maybe that’s just because that’s something I agree with, and you actually intended to cover both 1+2.
So I think the state of affairs right now for some key work is “barely funding constrained at all”. I think that’s helpful to be able to talk about, and it doesn’t seem egregious to me if people round it off as “not funding constrained”. But I’m worried that that has more (incorrect) connotations of “extra money isn’t helpful” than “funding overhang”.
The issue is that we need to be able to talk about two different things:
The value of deploying funding now for getting marginal work to happen right now;
The all-things-considered value of funding.
These are obviously related, but they can vary separately. I want to be able to express that #1 is very low (where it’s unproblematic if people approximate it as zero), but I’m definitely not OK with people approximating #2 as zero. In a different world #1 could be high while #2 was relatively low (in this case borrowing-to-give would be a good strategy).
[A very rough figure I’d be OK with people using for #2 is 100 nanodooms averted /$M (for funding that isn’t significantly correlated with other future EA funding sources; lower if correlated).]
I’m now noticing I’m unsure whether you disagree that it’s okay to approximate #1 as zero. I read your post as arguing against approximating #2 as zero, but maybe that’s just because that’s something I agree with, and you actually intended to cover both 1+2.