Effective altruism is not effective
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Effective altruism is not effective
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Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#2This is all about the framing. What question is being answered?
If the question is "which charity should I donate to" then we've already narrowed the scope to an individual's action with their own money. (Although there are some forms of collective behavior like crowdfunding.) The case for effective altruism seems pretty good within that space.
If you broaden your scope to all the things people could do working together, there are other possibilities, but even they often could use more funds.
Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#3I share some of these concerns. I was reading this book about the Congo recently:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06XCJ62YJ/
It's a fascinating book for many reasons, but one relevant part is its interviews with many locals that complain about the influence of NGOs in central Africa. It seems quite difficult to measure the success of an NGO in a country that is run by a dictatorship. There are cases where an organization starts working on a particular charitable cause, so the government immediately routes its own funding for that cause elsewhere. Or the only way for an NGO to operate is to pay high taxes to a corrupt government. So your money to these charities can essentially end up in the pocket of dictators, funding genocide.
I think about these when reading GiveWell's analyses of charity. Even things like mosquito nets - are we sure that these NGOs are really providing mosquito nets that wouldn't be provided otherwise? Or are they crowding out government spending, helping dictators free up more of their budget for other things? Or are mosquito nets simply the most appealing of many causes, the wealthy donors backing GiveWell could easily fund the entire demand for mosquito nets, and the cause is "kept alive" to enable GiveWell to raise more funds for other, less-obvious causes?
It's hard to do much more analysis of charities whose actions are so remote. I wish there were a GiveWell equivalent but just focused on giving to help the poor in California, not because I think the poor in California are so much more deserving than the rest of the world, but because I think we would be more able to observe which entities were spending money effectively.
Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#4This reads like a strawman perspective on the concept of 'effective altruism.'
The 'effective' part in the term is doing a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to the definition. It seems reasonable to focus on actually 'effective' actions with good outcomes, rather than comparatively ineffective virtual signalling or martyrdom.
Becoming rich and then helping millions of people with your means is more impactful than being poor and helping dozens. Both should be admired and encouraged, but one is clearly more 'effective' than the other.
Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#5The author pits private charity against government redistribution and criticizes the effective altruism movement for focusing on the former and distracting from the latter.
But it seems like there’s some question begging going on. Global poverty has dropped a lot over the last 50 years, and I don’t think it was because of private charity or government transfers. I could be wrong though. I just would like to have seen this point defended more instead of just asserted.
Definitely a good read though. Thanks for sharing.
Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#6This is all about the framing. What question is being answered? If the question is "which charity should I donate to" then we've already narrowed the scope to an individual's action with their own money. (Although there are some forms of collective behavior like crowdfunding.) The case for effective altruism seems pretty good within that space . If you broaden your scope to all the things people could do working toge…
You can individually choose to donate to political causes. Obviously anyone but the wealthiest can't single handedly influence large scale policy making, but lobbying and advocacy can have an outsized influence.
Edit: Consider that lobbying has an ROI of something like 1000x. If you can be anywhere close to that effective at directing government spending towards foreign aid, poverty reduction, public health, etc. then that could easily be more impactful than donating directly to NGOs
Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#7This reads like a strawman perspective on the concept of 'effective altruism.' The 'effective' part in the term is doing a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to the definition. It seems reasonable to focus on actually 'effective' actions with good outcomes, rather than comparatively ineffective virtual signalling or martyrdom. Becoming rich and then helping millions of people with your means is more impactful tha…
Both of your examples are individualistic, what about thousands or millions of poor people collectively fighting for something?
The total impact of collective action is much greater than the sum of its individual parts.
Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#8I share some of these concerns. I was reading this book about the Congo recently: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06XCJ62YJ/ It's a fascinating book for many reasons, but one relevant part is its interviews with many locals that complain about the influence of NGOs in central Africa. It seems quite difficult to measure the success of an NGO in a country that is run by a dictatorship. There are cases where an organization…
GiveWell does take into account what other organizations are doing with its evaluation of "room for more funding." For example, vaccines are pretty effective too, but apparently those efforts are well-funded already by other organizations with deep pockets?
I agree that it would be nice to see someone do evaluations that are restricted in scope to countries or regions.
Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#9I share some of these concerns. I was reading this book about the Congo recently: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06XCJ62YJ/ It's a fascinating book for many reasons, but one relevant part is its interviews with many locals that complain about the influence of NGOs in central Africa. It seems quite difficult to measure the success of an NGO in a country that is run by a dictatorship. There are cases where an organization…
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Re: Effective altruism is not effective
#10I share some of these concerns. I was reading this book about the Congo recently: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06XCJ62YJ/ It's a fascinating book for many reasons, but one relevant part is its interviews with many locals that complain about the influence of NGOs in central Africa. It seems quite difficult to measure the success of an NGO in a country that is run by a dictatorship. There are cases where an organization…
> Even things like mosquito nets - are we sure that these NGOs are really providing mosquito nets that wouldn't be provided otherwise?
There's an analysis of that particular issue: https://www.givewell.org/print/international/top-charities/a...
It seems that they typically would be provided, but months to years later.