Re: Leisure time. I think I would have probably either taken another class, gotten a part-time paying job as a TA, or done technical research with a professor if I weren’t leading EAB (which took ~10 hours of my time each week). I’m not positive how representative this is across the board, but I think this is likely true of at least some other chapter leaders, and more likely to be true of the most dedicated (who probably produce a disproportionate amount of the value of student groups).
On second thoughts, “leisure time” isn’t quite what I meant. I more thought that it would come out of other extracurriculars (e.g. chess society).
Anyway, I think there’s 3 main types of cost:
Immediate impact you could have had doing something else e.g. part-time job and donating the proceeds.
Better career capital you could have gained otherwise. I think this is probably the bigger issue. However, I also think running a local group is among the best options for career capital while a student, especially if you’re into EA. So it’s plausible the op cost is near zero. If you want to do research and give up doing a research project though, it could be pretty significant.
More fun you could have had elsewhere. This could be significant on a personal level, but it wouldn’t be a big factor in a calculation measured in terms of GiveWell dollars.
Okay, this makes more sense. I was mainly thinking of the second point—I agree that the first and third points don’t make too much of a difference. (However, some students can take on important jobs, eg. Oliver Habryka working at CEA while being a student.)
Another possibility is that you graduate faster. Instead of running a local group, you could take one extra course each semester. Aggregating this, for every two years of not running a local group, you could graduate a semester earlier.
(This would be for UC Berkeley, I think it should generalize about the same to other universities as well.)
Re: Leisure time. I think I would have probably either taken another class, gotten a part-time paying job as a TA, or done technical research with a professor if I weren’t leading EAB (which took ~10 hours of my time each week). I’m not positive how representative this is across the board, but I think this is likely true of at least some other chapter leaders, and more likely to be true of the most dedicated (who probably produce a disproportionate amount of the value of student groups).
Hmm, my comment about this was lost.
On second thoughts, “leisure time” isn’t quite what I meant. I more thought that it would come out of other extracurriculars (e.g. chess society).
Anyway, I think there’s 3 main types of cost:
Immediate impact you could have had doing something else e.g. part-time job and donating the proceeds.
Better career capital you could have gained otherwise. I think this is probably the bigger issue. However, I also think running a local group is among the best options for career capital while a student, especially if you’re into EA. So it’s plausible the op cost is near zero. If you want to do research and give up doing a research project though, it could be pretty significant.
More fun you could have had elsewhere. This could be significant on a personal level, but it wouldn’t be a big factor in a calculation measured in terms of GiveWell dollars.
Based on other students I know who put time into rationalist or EA societies this seems right.
Okay, this makes more sense. I was mainly thinking of the second point—I agree that the first and third points don’t make too much of a difference. (However, some students can take on important jobs, eg. Oliver Habryka working at CEA while being a student.)
Another possibility is that you graduate faster. Instead of running a local group, you could take one extra course each semester. Aggregating this, for every two years of not running a local group, you could graduate a semester earlier.
(This would be for UC Berkeley, I think it should generalize about the same to other universities as well.)