The value of re-directing non-EA funding to EA orgs might still be under-appreciated. While we obsess over (rightly so) where EA funding should be going, shifting money from one EA cause to another “better” ne might often only make an incremental difference, while moving money from a non-EA pool to fund cost-effective interventions might make an order of magnitude difference.
There’s nothing new to see here. High impact foundations are being cultivated to shift donor funding to effective causes, the “Center for effective aid policy” was set up (then shut down) to shift governement money to more effective causes, and many great EAs work in public service jobs partly to redirect money. The Lead exposure action fund spearheaded by OpenPhil is hopefully re-directing millions to a fantastic cause as we speak.
I would love to see an analysis (might have missed it) which estimates the “cost-effectiveness” of redirecting a dollar into a 10x or 100x more cost-effective intervention, How much money/time would it be worth spending to redirect money this way? Also I’d like to get my head around how much might the working “cost-effectiveness” of an org improve if its budget shifted from 10% non-EA funding to 90% non- EA funding.
There are obviously costs to roping in non-EA funding. From my own experience it often takes huge time and energy. One thing I’ve appreciated about my 2 attempts applying for EA adjacent funding is just how straightforward It has been – probably an order of magnitude less work than other applications.
Here’s a few practical ideas to how we could further redirect funds
EA orgs could put more effort into helping each other access non-EA money. This is already happening through the AIM cluster, but I feel the scope could be widened to other orgs, and co-ordination could be improved a lot without too much effort. I’m sure pools of money are getting missed all the time. For example I sure hope we’re doing whatever we can through our networks to help EA gender based violence orgs / family planning orgs to get hold of some of this 250 million dollars from Melinda.
When assessing cost-effectiveness of new interventions and charities (especially global health), I think potential to access non-EA future funding could be taken into account. If a new charity has a relatively smooth path to millions of dollars of external funding, should our cost-effectiveness bar be lower? Again this might well be happening already.
We might have a blind spot missing cause areas where cost-effectiveness might initially look sub-optimal, but huge available non-EA money-pools might shift the calculus. One example is climate mitigation, where Billions of dollars slosh around, wasted on ineffective interventions. Many “mitigation activities” I see here in northern Uganda might as well be burning money (in a carbon neutral way of course). GiveDirectly have made a great play here re-directing millions of climate mitigations funds to cash transfers. Could other “climate mitigation orgs” be set up to utilise this money better even if the end point of the money wasn’t strictly climate related?
I would imagine far smarter people have thought about this far more deeply, but there might still be room for more exploration and awareness here.
The CE of redirecting money is simply (dollars raised per dollar spent) * (difference in CE between your use of the money vs counterfactual use). So if GD raises $10 from climate mitigation for every $1 it spent, and that money would have otherwise been neutral, then that’s a cost-effectiveness of 10x in GiveWell units.
There’s nothing complicated about estimating the value of leverage. The problem is actually doing leverage. Everyone is trying to leverage everyone else. When there is money to be had, there are a bunch of organizations trying to influence how it is spent. Melinda French Gates is likely deluged with organizations trying to pitch her for money. The CEAP shutdown post you mentioned puts it perfectly:
The core thesis of our charity fell prey to the 1% fallacy. Within any country, much of the development budget is fixed and difficult to move. For example, most countries will have made binding commitments spanning several years to fund various projects and institutions. Another large chunk is going to be spent on political priorities (funding Ukraine, taking in refugees, etc.) which is also difficult for an outsider to influence.
What is left is fought over by hundreds, if not thousands of NGOs all looking for funding. I can’t think of any other government budget with as many entities fighting over as small a budget. The NGOs which survive in this space, are those which were best at getting grants. Like other industries dependent on government subsidies, they fight tooth and nail to ensure those subsidies stay put.
This doesn’t mean that leverage is impossible. It just means that leverage opportunities tend to be specific and limited. We have to take them on opportunistically, rather than making leverage a theory of impact.
I largely agree, although I don’t think we’re trying to leverage money that hard in some areas areas. I do think there needs to be some strategy for leverage as well as a lot of opportunism as you say. Collaboration as I mentioned opens up opportunities as well.
Sometimes also it’s not so hard to access pools of money, for example how many orgs are trying hard to access all that climate money?
On the subject of redirecting streams of money from less impactful causes to EA causes, I feel I need to beat my drum regarding the potential of Profit for Good businesses (businesses with charities in all or almost all of the shareholder position). In such cases, to the extent EA PFGs profits displace those of normal businesses, funds are diverted from the average shareholder to an effective charity.
So when a business like Humanitix (PFG helping projects in the developing world, $4mil AUD to The Life You Can Save) displaces the marketshare of Ticketmaster, funds are diverted not from charities, but from the funds of the business’s competitors. This method of diversion seems less difficult because the operative actors (consumers, employees, business partners) are not deciding between a strong non-EA charity often optimized for warm fuzzies and marketing, but rather choosing between products with similar value propositions, but where engaging with one—in addition to the other value proposition—implies helping fight malaria or something instead of enriching a random investor.
If you’re interested in learning more about Profit for Good, here is a reading list on the subject.
The value of re-directing non-EA funding to EA orgs might still be under-appreciated. While we obsess over (rightly so) where EA funding should be going, shifting money from one EA cause to another “better” ne might often only make an incremental difference, while moving money from a non-EA pool to fund cost-effective interventions might make an order of magnitude difference.
There’s nothing new to see here. High impact foundations are being cultivated to shift donor funding to effective causes, the “Center for effective aid policy” was set up (then shut down) to shift governement money to more effective causes, and many great EAs work in public service jobs partly to redirect money. The Lead exposure action fund spearheaded by OpenPhil is hopefully re-directing millions to a fantastic cause as we speak.
I would love to see an analysis (might have missed it) which estimates the “cost-effectiveness” of redirecting a dollar into a 10x or 100x more cost-effective intervention, How much money/time would it be worth spending to redirect money this way? Also I’d like to get my head around how much might the working “cost-effectiveness” of an org improve if its budget shifted from 10% non-EA funding to 90% non- EA funding.
There are obviously costs to roping in non-EA funding. From my own experience it often takes huge time and energy. One thing I’ve appreciated about my 2 attempts applying for EA adjacent funding is just how straightforward It has been – probably an order of magnitude less work than other applications.
Here’s a few practical ideas to how we could further redirect funds
EA orgs could put more effort into helping each other access non-EA money. This is already happening through the AIM cluster, but I feel the scope could be widened to other orgs, and co-ordination could be improved a lot without too much effort. I’m sure pools of money are getting missed all the time. For example I sure hope we’re doing whatever we can through our networks to help EA gender based violence orgs / family planning orgs to get hold of some of this 250 million dollars from Melinda.
When assessing cost-effectiveness of new interventions and charities (especially global health), I think potential to access non-EA future funding could be taken into account. If a new charity has a relatively smooth path to millions of dollars of external funding, should our cost-effectiveness bar be lower? Again this might well be happening already.
We might have a blind spot missing cause areas where cost-effectiveness might initially look sub-optimal, but huge available non-EA money-pools might shift the calculus. One example is climate mitigation, where Billions of dollars slosh around, wasted on ineffective interventions. Many “mitigation activities” I see here in northern Uganda might as well be burning money (in a carbon neutral way of course). GiveDirectly have made a great play here re-directing millions of climate mitigations funds to cash transfers. Could other “climate mitigation orgs” be set up to utilise this money better even if the end point of the money wasn’t strictly climate related?
I would imagine far smarter people have thought about this far more deeply, but there might still be room for more exploration and awareness here.
The CE of redirecting money is simply (dollars raised per dollar spent) * (difference in CE between your use of the money vs counterfactual use). So if GD raises $10 from climate mitigation for every $1 it spent, and that money would have otherwise been neutral, then that’s a cost-effectiveness of 10x in GiveWell units.
There’s nothing complicated about estimating the value of leverage. The problem is actually doing leverage. Everyone is trying to leverage everyone else. When there is money to be had, there are a bunch of organizations trying to influence how it is spent. Melinda French Gates is likely deluged with organizations trying to pitch her for money. The CEAP shutdown post you mentioned puts it perfectly:
This doesn’t mean that leverage is impossible. It just means that leverage opportunities tend to be specific and limited. We have to take them on opportunistically, rather than making leverage a theory of impact.
I largely agree, although I don’t think we’re trying to leverage money that hard in some areas areas. I do think there needs to be some strategy for leverage as well as a lot of opportunism as you say. Collaboration as I mentioned opens up opportunities as well.
Sometimes also it’s not so hard to access pools of money, for example how many orgs are trying hard to access all that climate money?
On the subject of redirecting streams of money from less impactful causes to EA causes, I feel I need to beat my drum regarding the potential of Profit for Good businesses (businesses with charities in all or almost all of the shareholder position). In such cases, to the extent EA PFGs profits displace those of normal businesses, funds are diverted from the average shareholder to an effective charity.
So when a business like Humanitix (PFG helping projects in the developing world, $4mil AUD to The Life You Can Save) displaces the marketshare of Ticketmaster, funds are diverted not from charities, but from the funds of the business’s competitors. This method of diversion seems less difficult because the operative actors (consumers, employees, business partners) are not deciding between a strong non-EA charity often optimized for warm fuzzies and marketing, but rather choosing between products with similar value propositions, but where engaging with one—in addition to the other value proposition—implies helping fight malaria or something instead of enriching a random investor.
If you’re interested in learning more about Profit for Good, here is a reading list on the subject.