I’d guess that the labor should be valued at significantly more than $100k per person-year. Your calculation suggests that 64% of EA resources spent are funding and 36% are labour, but given that we’re talent-constrained, I would guess that the labor should be valued at something closer to $400k/y, suggesting a split of 31%/69% between funding and talent, respectively. (Or put differently, I’d guess >20 people pursuing direct work could make >$10 million per year if they tried earning to give, and they’re presumably working on things more valuable than that, so the total should be a lot higher than $200 million.)
Using those figures, the overallocation to global poverty looks less severe, we’re over- rather than underallocating to meta, and the other areas look roughly similar (e.g., there still is a large gap in AI).
Regarding the overallocation to meta, one caveat is that the question was multi-select, and many people who picked that might only do a relatively small amount of meta work, so perhaps we’re allocating the appropriate amount.
I agree that figure is really uncertain. Another issue is that the mean is driven by the tails.
For that reason, I mostly prefer to look at funding and the percentage of people separately, rather than the combined figure—though I thought I should provide the combined figure as well.
On the specifics:
I’d guess >20 people pursuing direct work could make >$10 million per year if they tried earning to give
That seems plausible, though jtbc the relevant reference class is the 7,000 most engaged EAs rather than the people currently doing (or about to start doing) direct work. I think that group might in expectation donate several fold-less than the narrower reference class.
I’d guess that the labor should be valued at significantly more than $100k per person-year. Your calculation suggests that 64% of EA resources spent are funding and 36% are labour, but given that we’re talent-constrained, I would guess that the labor should be valued at something closer to $400k/y, suggesting a split of 31%/69% between funding and talent, respectively. (Or put differently, I’d guess >20 people pursuing direct work could make >$10 million per year if they tried earning to give, and they’re presumably working on things more valuable than that, so the total should be a lot higher than $200 million.)
Using those figures, the overallocation to global poverty looks less severe, we’re over- rather than underallocating to meta, and the other areas look roughly similar (e.g., there still is a large gap in AI).
Regarding the overallocation to meta, one caveat is that the question was multi-select, and many people who picked that might only do a relatively small amount of meta work, so perhaps we’re allocating the appropriate amount.
Link to spreadsheet
I agree that figure is really uncertain. Another issue is that the mean is driven by the tails.
For that reason, I mostly prefer to look at funding and the percentage of people separately, rather than the combined figure—though I thought I should provide the combined figure as well.
On the specifics:
That seems plausible, though jtbc the relevant reference class is the 7,000 most engaged EAs rather than the people currently doing (or about to start doing) direct work. I think that group might in expectation donate several fold-less than the narrower reference class.
Thanks, agreed!