Holden also wrote (by the way, I think your link is broken):
We fully funded things we thought were much better than the “last dollar” (including certain top charities grants) but not things we thought were relatively close when they also posed coordination issues. For this case, fully funding top charities would have had pros and cons relative to splitting: we think the dollars we spent would’ve done slightly more good, but the dollars spent by others would’ve done less good (and we think we have a good sense of the counterfactual for most of those dollars). We guessed that the latter outweighed the former.
So an important crux here is the proportion of small-donor money to e.g. GiveWell charities that would be crowded out into much less effective charities or to new projects with high expected value. For reference, GiveWell has moved about $30-40 million a year in small donations. I am not sure what proportion of that comes from people who are not closely aligned/affiliated with the EA community, but I would guess it’s the majority.
I would question whether Holden is correct though. Global health/development is a big space, so if Good Ventures increased funding to GiveWell top charities by a lot, GiveWell would still exist and would move their recommendations over to interventions that aren’t fully funded yet. For example, cash transfers seemingly could absorb a lot of money, and the Gates Foundation probably moves more to global poverty causes every year than GoodVentures will spend per year at its peak. The claim seems to depend on small GiveWell donors being excited by GiveWell’s specific top charities right now, such that they would not give to GiveWell top charities if the current top charities were fully funded and GiveWell issued new recommendations, and would instead give to charities even less effective than these new top charities. That might be true if donors are really motivated by the headline cost-per-life-saved number rather than being attracted by GiveWell’s research and methodology. I don’t have a very strong intuition either way, so I’d be curious if someone more knowledgeable could shed some light.
Thanks, looks like that’s actually caused by a bug in EA Forum. I’ll do a workaround and notify the admins. And thanks for the Holden quote, which I’ll reply to below:
but the dollars spent by others would’ve done less good (and we think we have a good sense of the counterfactual for most of those dollars).
A possible solution here is to let people donate to a fund controlled by OpenPhil or GiveWell, and then they can coordinate amongst themselves to maximize good done per dollar.
We guessed that the latter outweighed the former.
Given the huge amounts of money/value involved here, I think detailed analysis, empirical investigations, and creative solutions are called for, not just a guess.
Holden also wrote (by the way, I think your link is broken):
So an important crux here is the proportion of small-donor money to e.g. GiveWell charities that would be crowded out into much less effective charities or to new projects with high expected value. For reference, GiveWell has moved about $30-40 million a year in small donations. I am not sure what proportion of that comes from people who are not closely aligned/affiliated with the EA community, but I would guess it’s the majority.
I would question whether Holden is correct though. Global health/development is a big space, so if Good Ventures increased funding to GiveWell top charities by a lot, GiveWell would still exist and would move their recommendations over to interventions that aren’t fully funded yet. For example, cash transfers seemingly could absorb a lot of money, and the Gates Foundation probably moves more to global poverty causes every year than GoodVentures will spend per year at its peak. The claim seems to depend on small GiveWell donors being excited by GiveWell’s specific top charities right now, such that they would not give to GiveWell top charities if the current top charities were fully funded and GiveWell issued new recommendations, and would instead give to charities even less effective than these new top charities. That might be true if donors are really motivated by the headline cost-per-life-saved number rather than being attracted by GiveWell’s research and methodology. I don’t have a very strong intuition either way, so I’d be curious if someone more knowledgeable could shed some light.
Thanks, looks like that’s actually caused by a bug in EA Forum. I’ll do a workaround and notify the admins. And thanks for the Holden quote, which I’ll reply to below:
A possible solution here is to let people donate to a fund controlled by OpenPhil or GiveWell, and then they can coordinate amongst themselves to maximize good done per dollar.
Given the huge amounts of money/value involved here, I think detailed analysis, empirical investigations, and creative solutions are called for, not just a guess.
(test link for the admins, please ignore)