I'm curious about the roles of Giving What We Can and Founders Pledge in driving donations to EA causes.
Both organizations play a similar role in persuading people to give money to highly effective causes, but it seems to me that GWWC focuses on getting a large number of average-income people to donate relatively small amounts of money, whereas Founders Pledge focuses on getting a smaller number of entrepreneurs to donate large amounts of money.
I think that both types of movement growth are important in different ways. On the one hand, having even a small number of large donors means we have a lot of funding, which allows us to make a great impact. (Even with the collapse of FTX in 2022, there is still a chance that the EA movement could have more billionaire backers by 2027 than it does now.) On the other hand, a large number of donors means there are a large number of individuals engaging in the philosophy and practice of EA, which helps spread the ideas of EA and demonstrate its accessibility.
What are your opinions on how GWWC and FP's roles in generating movement growth compare and contrast? Which kind of movement growth is more important for the EA movement right now?
Appendix: Relevant statistics
GWWC and FP's membership numbers:
- GWWC has over 9,400 individuals with active pledges as of January 28, 2024[1]
- Founders Pledge has 1,767 members as of 2022, their latest impact report[2]
Amounts pledged:
- FP: "$1.3 billion pledged to charity from 80 new members"[2]
- GWWC estimates that $83 million of lifetime value will be generated from the new pledges taken in 2020-2022 (a three year period), or an average of $27 million of lifetime value from new pledges per year.[3]
Giving multiplier: GWWC estimates that it generates $30 for every $1 invested in its operations. I couldn't find an estimate of FP's giving multiplier effect, but I think it would be useful for comparison.
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Our members - GWWC
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2022 Impact Report - Founders Pledge
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2020–2022 Impact evaluation - GWWC