I think it’s interesting that an impact investing fund is making the comparison to Givewell. This is far from widespread in the philanthropic world, and is even rarer in investing.
I predict that I probably wouldn’t agree with the 3x claim if scrutinised properly.
I sympathise with the point made by Michael St Jules about quality of evidence, but I’m more worried about counterfactuals. I.e. if GIF had not made those investments, how likely is it that someone else would have?
Actually, they are more of a grant fund than an impact investment fund. I’ve updated the post to clarify this. Thanks for bringing it up.
One might call them an ‘investing for impact’ fund—making whatever investments they think will generate the biggest long-term impact.
The reported projections aren’t adjusted for counterfactuals (or additionality, contribution, funging, etc.). I wonder if the fact we’re mostly talking about GIF grants vs GiveWell grants changes your worry at all?
For my part, I’d be excited to see more grant analyses (in addition to impact investment analyses) explicitly account for counterfactuals. I believe GiveWell does make some adjustments for funging, though I’m uncertain if they are comprehensive enough.
I think it’s interesting that an impact investing fund is making the comparison to Givewell. This is far from widespread in the philanthropic world, and is even rarer in investing.
I predict that I probably wouldn’t agree with the 3x claim if scrutinised properly.
I sympathise with the point made by Michael St Jules about quality of evidence, but I’m more worried about counterfactuals. I.e. if GIF had not made those investments, how likely is it that someone else would have?
Actually, they are more of a grant fund than an impact investment fund. I’ve updated the post to clarify this. Thanks for bringing it up.
One might call them an ‘investing for impact’ fund—making whatever investments they think will generate the biggest long-term impact.
The reported projections aren’t adjusted for counterfactuals (or additionality, contribution, funging, etc.). I wonder if the fact we’re mostly talking about GIF grants vs GiveWell grants changes your worry at all?
For my part, I’d be excited to see more grant analyses (in addition to impact investment analyses) explicitly account for counterfactuals. I believe GiveWell does make some adjustments for funging, though I’m uncertain if they are comprehensive enough.