If someone says âlook, Iâll do the work, and I will be excellent, but you have to pay me $150k a year or I walkâ I would doubt that were that serious about helping other people. Theyâd sound more like your classic corporate lawyer than an effective effective altruist.
Adding to my other comment, there are several reasons I might choose a different job if I were paid <<150k, even as someone who is basically dedicated to maximizing my impact.
My bargain with the EA machine lets selfish parts of me enjoy a comfortable lifestyle in exchange for giving EA work my all.
Salaries between EA orgs should be a signal of value in order to align incentives. If EA org A is paying less than org B, but I add more value at org A, this is a wrong incentive that could be fixed at little cost.
There are time-money tradeoffs like nice apartments and meal delivery that make my productivity substantially higher with more money.
Having financial security is really good for my mental health and ability to take risks; in the extreme case, poverty mindset is a huge hit to both.
Underpaying people might be a bad omen. The organization might be confusing sacrifice with impact, be constrained by external optics, unable to make trades between other resources, or might have trouble getting funding because large funders donât think theyâre promising.
Being paid, say, 15% of what I could probably make in industry just feels insulting. This is not an ideal situation, but pay is tied up with status in our society, especially taking pay cuts.
An organization that cuts my pay might be exhibiting distrust and expecting me to spend the money poorly; this is also negative signal.
Adding to my other comment, there are several reasons I might choose a different job if I were paid <<150k, even as someone who is basically dedicated to maximizing my impact.
My bargain with the EA machine lets selfish parts of me enjoy a comfortable lifestyle in exchange for giving EA work my all.
Salaries between EA orgs should be a signal of value in order to align incentives. If EA org A is paying less than org B, but I add more value at org A, this is a wrong incentive that could be fixed at little cost.
There are time-money tradeoffs like nice apartments and meal delivery that make my productivity substantially higher with more money.
Having financial security is really good for my mental health and ability to take risks; in the extreme case, poverty mindset is a huge hit to both.
Underpaying people might be a bad omen. The organization might be confusing sacrifice with impact, be constrained by external optics, unable to make trades between other resources, or might have trouble getting funding because large funders donât think theyâre promising.
Being paid, say, 15% of what I could probably make in industry just feels insulting. This is not an ideal situation, but pay is tied up with status in our society, especially taking pay cuts.
An organization that cuts my pay might be exhibiting distrust and expecting me to spend the money poorly; this is also negative signal.