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Join Wall Street. Save the world

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Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#91

Post by glomph »

clarkm wrote: post #19
michaelkeenan wrote: post #8

If you're interested in effective altruism, you might be interested in the Effective Altruism Summit, which will be held from June 30 to July 6 in San Francisco. All four of the effective altruism organizations mentioned in the article (GiveWell, Giving What We Can, The Life You Can Save, and 80,000 Hours) are participating, along with some not mentioned. Peter Singer, Peter Thiel, and Jaan Tallinn (co-creator of Kaz…

At a similar event on Efficient Charity at the Berkeley Faculty Club, Robin Hanson made some interesting (and unsettling) points about how most charities operate. [1] For example, he claims that most charitable contributions are actually about status signalling and not about maximizing impact. Because if someone truly wanted to do the Most Helpful Thing, they would save all their money and donate a single lump sum to…

That is absurd. Charities know about interest rates. If that is the best way to use money (and you choose an effective charity) that is what they will do. But the fact is they can get better returns now by either spending your money on fundraising/awareness or by having real impact now.

Spending money on achieving their goals in the present is not only what they are for but will also reduce future costs. Prevention is better than cure.

Also there are problems that need solving now. If the current generation of philanthropists all wait until they die then there will not be enough money to solve problems that exist in the present.

Why would you think that you know how to use money to achieve a goal better than an organization built around that goal?

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#92

Post by tptacek »

jacquesm wrote: post #88
rayiner wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's wrong with trading commodities? Remember, derivatives were invented by farmers to address very practical problems in that domain.

You'll know what's wrong with trading commodities when you see untold volumes grown and then destroyed because certain price points can't be met on wallstreet. Combine subsidies and capitalism and you get the weirdest excesses.

How much do you actually know, nuts and bolts, about agricultural commodities trading, Jacques?

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#93

Post by ivansavz »

barry-cotter wrote: post #87
ivansavz wrote: post #70

I am completely appalled by this article. How could working for the system (in this case, the finance sector) ever be considered as a positive gain? The state of the world affairs is f'd precisely because currently all aspects of life are viewed through a mechanistic view focused on short term financial gain. Wall street, by supporting and feeding the mega-corps, is indirectly part of the economic exploitation of the…

The proper gauge of a charity is not overhead but lives saved per unit money, whether you go for acturial lives saved or quality adjusted life years. If the charity your webmaster friend worked at saved a life for $1,800 donated it would be a good place to donate money. Jason Trigg probably saved 20 lives last year. Are you saying that what he did is bad?

Jason Trigg actually sounds like a good guy and I applaud him for his choice. My disagreeing is with the idea of ethical-corporate-whorism being a viable way to do good in the world---the "new trend" the article purports to have discovered.

Let's assume for the moment that donating 50k/y led to some tangible benefits for humanity. Were there any human costs as well? Were people actively harmed for him to obtain the 100k/y salary?

The chain of implications between actual harm being done on the ground (say in a 3rd world country) and Jason's day to day job is very long and whitewashed by buzzwords, but it is still there:

   Company X1 deals with gov. of country Y to rob people of a water resource (buzzword: privatization)
   Company X2 owns X1 stock  (buzzword: market)
   Company X3 trades in X2 stock
   Company X4 makes high-freq deals for X3 (buzzword: fluidity)
So the people have no water, but nobody is responsible!

Meanwhile a new charity forms: let's give money so that the people of Y can have drinking water.

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#94

Post by ivansavz »

BrentRitterbeck wrote: post #82
ivansavz wrote: post #70

I am completely appalled by this article. How could working for the system (in this case, the finance sector) ever be considered as a positive gain? The state of the world affairs is f'd precisely because currently all aspects of life are viewed through a mechanistic view focused on short term financial gain. Wall street, by supporting and feeding the mega-corps, is indirectly part of the economic exploitation of the…

What about those that go into risk management at a big Wall Street firm because they view this as the best use of their background? Would you rather have someone who didn't understand the mathematical intricacies of fixed income managing the risk of an entity capable of bringing an economy to a halt, or would you prefer that job to be taken by someone who knew what they were doing?

> managing the risk of an entity capable of bringing an economy to a halt

I am more worried about talented quants building/inventing new financial products which lead to further instability and //cause// risk.

From what I hear from friends who work in the field, they don't have much control over company policy and direction. At the risk of sounding provocative, I will say that quants are glorified code monkeys. The fact that they are really smart will not allow them to influence decisions. If it is not clearly illegal and it makes profits, it will be done halt or no halt.

The way I see it, the less "advances" in the financial sector there are, the better.

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#95

Post by clicks »

tptacek wrote: post #92
jacquesm wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'll know what's wrong with trading commodities when you see untold volumes grown and then destroyed because certain price points can't be met on wallstreet. Combine subsidies and capitalism and you get the weirdest excesses.

How much do you actually know, nuts and bolts, about agricultural commodities trading, Jacques?

Should I start following up your comments with "How much do you actually know about ${DISCUSSION_TOPIC}, Thomas?"

Seriously, can you please stop with the snippy responses? This is a place for discussion not credentialing. When you make condescending comments like this it just makes this place personally confrontational, it does not progress a discussion. Please try your hardest in refraining from making such comments in the future.

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#96

Post by tptacek »

clicks wrote: post #95
tptacek wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much do you actually know, nuts and bolts, about agricultural commodities trading, Jacques?

Should I start following up your comments with "How much do you actually know about ${DISCUSSION_TOPIC}, Thomas?" Seriously, can you please stop with the snippy responses? This is a place for discussion not credentialing. When you make condescending comments like this it just makes this place personally confrontational, it does not progress a discussion. Please try your hardest in refraining from making such comments…

Knowledge and experience aren't credentials. In fact, the question I asked is sort of the opposite of a credentials question.

In fairness: I think you accurately identified the subtext of my question! I like Jacques and presume that he has more knowledge than me about a lot of things, but my intuition on this thread was that he was going to quote that "How Goldman Sachs Created The Food Crisis" article, or something derived from it, and conveniently ignore the central role commodities trading has in locking in prices for perishable products in the face of uncertain supply/demand.

But just because I'm honest about the subtext of that comment doesn't make the comment itself rude; I worded it to create the opportunity for Jacques to come back with something like "I worked for years in trading markets and am very familiar with ag futures markets", which, for all we know, he still might.

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#97

Post by blueprint »

"There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root, and it may be that he who bestows the largest amount of time and money on the needy is doing the most by his mode of life to produce that misery which he strives in vain to relieve."

Henry David Thoreau

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#98

Post by barry-cotter »

ivansavz wrote: post #93
barry-cotter wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The proper gauge of a charity is not overhead but lives saved per unit money, whether you go for acturial lives saved or quality adjusted life years. If the charity your webmaster friend worked at saved a life for $1,800 donated it would be a good place to donate money. Jason Trigg probably saved 20 lives last year. Are you saying that what he did is bad?

Jason Trigg actually sounds like a good guy and I applaud him for his choice. My disagreeing is with the idea of ethical-corporate-whorism being a viable way to do good in the world---the "new trend" the article purports to have discovered. Let's assume for the moment that donating 50k/y led to some tangible benefits for humanity. Were there any human costs as well? Were people actively harmed for him to obtain the 1…

I'm glad to engage in this discussion with you but I'm not the best person to do it. My personal response would be to look at the marginal impact Jason Trigg is making, i.e. what is different about the world because of what he did or did not do. If he didn't take that HFT job someone elsse would have, and the overwhelming likelihood is that that person would not have saved twenty lives through their donations.

Now, government or political activism may be the best way for some people to do the most good. This is actually an active subject of research and discussion in the effective altruism movement.

If you want to discuss this topic with people who know and care more about than me this guy's posts are mostly about effective altruism/efficient philanthrophy.

http://lesswrong.com/user/JonahSinick/submitted/

Most of the background assumptions the people involved in this movement agree upon are in these two posts.

lesswrong.com/lw/65/money_the_unit_of_caring

http://lesswrong.com/lw/6z/purchase_fuzzies_and_utilons_sepa...

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#99

Post by cbr »

glomph wrote: post #91
clarkm wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At a similar event on Efficient Charity at the Berkeley Faculty Club, Robin Hanson made some interesting (and unsettling) points about how most charities operate. [1] For example, he claims that most charitable contributions are actually about status signalling and not about maximizing impact. Because if someone truly wanted to do the Most Helpful Thing, they would save all their money and donate a single lump sum to…

That is absurd. Charities know about interest rates. If that is the best way to use money (and you choose an effective charity) that is what they will do. But the fact is they can get better returns now by either spending your money on fundraising/awareness or by having real impact now. Spending money on achieving their goals in the present is not only what they are for but will also reduce future costs. Prevention i…

"If that is the best way to use money (and you choose an effective charity) that is what they will do."

There are actually a lot of legal constraints on charities that make "invest the money for decades and then spend it" not work well for them. If you think this is what makes the most sense at this point you pretty much need to do it yourself, potentially with a donor-advised fund.

"Prevention is better than cure."

Sometimes. There are tradeoffs, and depending on what you're working on either can be more efficient.

(I agree with your bottom line, that giving money now is important, but for different reasons.)

Re: Join Wall Street. Save the world

#100

Post by cbr »

swampthing wrote: post #20
nickpinkston wrote: post #16

Join Wall Street. Attempt to save the world through donations. End up unable to recognize what to solve. This is a pattern that all these guys do. Even Warren Buffet just gave his money to Gates. You'd think a guy who spends his life picking out successful businesses would be able to recognize this in non-profit / social ventures, but he's so removed from real problems he can't. If you want to save the world, save th…

The question is whether the world is better off if Buffet had taken your advice. Not clear that it would be?

We can't talk just about Buffett without considering reference classes. Before starting his career investing, Buffet didn't know he would do as well as he did.
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