Executive summary: There are many important and tractable research questions in economics that can have a significant impact, spanning areas such as forecasting, climate change, international relations, economic growth, public choice, development economics, effective altruism, and more.
Key points:
Forecasting research can improve long-term predictions, inform policy decisions, and explore how to best communicate forecasts. Key questions involve improving forecasting methods, understanding forecaster incentives and biases, and forecasting technological change.
Exploring concrete future scenarios by changing one key variable can yield valuable insights into potential outcomes and inform our understanding of similar scenarios.
Climate change research should compare long-term energy forecasts, analyze international agreements, explore the role of central banks, and consider geoengineering.
International relations research can study pandemic response agreements, the impact of new military technologies, the success of war forecasting, and the feasibility of enforceable international agreements.
Economic growth research should aim to better understand and shape future growth, explain current low growth despite rapid technological progress, explore post-growth economies, and analyze the potential impacts of transformative AI.
Studying effective altruism and other relevant social groups can help increase funding for effective charities, understand engagement with altruism, and improve academic incentives. Research into optimal philanthropic spending is also valuable.
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, andcontact us if you have feedback.
Executive summary: There are many important and tractable research questions in economics that can have a significant impact, spanning areas such as forecasting, climate change, international relations, economic growth, public choice, development economics, effective altruism, and more.
Key points:
Forecasting research can improve long-term predictions, inform policy decisions, and explore how to best communicate forecasts. Key questions involve improving forecasting methods, understanding forecaster incentives and biases, and forecasting technological change.
Exploring concrete future scenarios by changing one key variable can yield valuable insights into potential outcomes and inform our understanding of similar scenarios.
Climate change research should compare long-term energy forecasts, analyze international agreements, explore the role of central banks, and consider geoengineering.
International relations research can study pandemic response agreements, the impact of new military technologies, the success of war forecasting, and the feasibility of enforceable international agreements.
Economic growth research should aim to better understand and shape future growth, explain current low growth despite rapid technological progress, explore post-growth economies, and analyze the potential impacts of transformative AI.
Studying effective altruism and other relevant social groups can help increase funding for effective charities, understand engagement with altruism, and improve academic incentives. Research into optimal philanthropic spending is also valuable.
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, and contact us if you have feedback.