I agree with the thrust of the argument here but I think your estimate for the size of the EA-aligned graduate pool is far too large.
I helped run the group at Warwick (top 10 uni) for a couple of years. For each year I was on the committee, I would be surprised and very happy if more than 5 graduates identified as ‘committed EAs’. I would also say that Warwick has one of the more active groups outside of Oxbridge. My fermi for the size of the EA grad pool each year would therefore be something more like:
Oxford and Cambridge: 200 (this strikes me as high but I’ll defer to you)
~10 other unis with active groups: 50
~10 other unis with small groups: 20 (most uncertain about this number)
10-20% of those graduates actually applying for non-technical EA roles seems about right so I think the number is more like 25-50. The resultant ratio is still undesirable so I’ve no doubt that there are many grads out there having difficulty getting hired which is saddening and made all the more visceral by the recent post.
I ran the EA Berkeley group and later the UWashington group, and even this estimate seems high to me (but it would be within my 90% confidence bound, whereas 2000 is definitely not in it).
Thanks. Interesting perspective. I’d love to know how many applications these orgs get on average for such roles. I guess my bet implies low hundreds, and I’d have to recalibrate if it were tens or thousands.
Hundreds of EA applicants? Most EA org roles don’t have that… I’ve been in/around MIRI, Ought, FHI and many other EA orgs. It’s common to have about a hundred applicants for a role (research or ops) and the number of EA applicants is usually in the tens.
How do you know out of that hundred whether the applicant is EA motivated or not? It’s not the kind of thing I would put in a cover letter (when it could be substituted for a more concrete statement about why the org’s work is important). Nor would it be obvious on a CV unless they had led a chapter or something. Although clearly p*100 ⇐ 100…
Cover letters to core EA orgs from EAs generally indicate interest in EA. It’s sometimes also indicated by involvement in EA groups, through a CV, by referral sources, and by interviews. You can pretty reliably tell.
I agree with the thrust of the argument here but I think your estimate for the size of the EA-aligned graduate pool is far too large.
I helped run the group at Warwick (top 10 uni) for a couple of years. For each year I was on the committee, I would be surprised and very happy if more than 5 graduates identified as ‘committed EAs’. I would also say that Warwick has one of the more active groups outside of Oxbridge. My fermi for the size of the EA grad pool each year would therefore be something more like:
Oxford and Cambridge: 200 (this strikes me as high but I’ll defer to you)
~10 other unis with active groups: 50
~10 other unis with small groups: 20 (most uncertain about this number)
10-20% of those graduates actually applying for non-technical EA roles seems about right so I think the number is more like 25-50. The resultant ratio is still undesirable so I’ve no doubt that there are many grads out there having difficulty getting hired which is saddening and made all the more visceral by the recent post.
I ran the EA Berkeley group and later the UWashington group, and even this estimate seems high to me (but it would be within my 90% confidence bound, whereas 2000 is definitely not in it).
Thanks. Interesting perspective. I’d love to know how many applications these orgs get on average for such roles. I guess my bet implies low hundreds, and I’d have to recalibrate if it were tens or thousands.
Hundreds of EA applicants? Most EA org roles don’t have that… I’ve been in/around MIRI, Ought, FHI and many other EA orgs. It’s common to have about a hundred applicants for a role (research or ops) and the number of EA applicants is usually in the tens.
How do you know out of that hundred whether the applicant is EA motivated or not? It’s not the kind of thing I would put in a cover letter (when it could be substituted for a more concrete statement about why the org’s work is important). Nor would it be obvious on a CV unless they had led a chapter or something. Although clearly p*100 ⇐ 100…
Cover letters to core EA orgs from EAs generally indicate interest in EA. It’s sometimes also indicated by involvement in EA groups, through a CV, by referral sources, and by interviews. You can pretty reliably tell.