I recently became aware of an event targeted at high profile EAs that was described as an opportunity to bring together philanthropists and experts for longtermist talks/discussion opportunities. Aside from these discussion opportunities, there was opportunities for what many people might deem very upscale, expensive experiences - stays in luxury hotel rooms, travel in luxury cars, hot air ballooning, petting micropigs, etc. All activities were funded by the EA org hosting the event. I would like to hear thoughts on the implications of EA spending in this way, as my initial reaction is quite strongly against this. However, there may be a lot more to explore here.

One argument in favour of spending this way could begin with the idea that the EA contributions of the kind of high profile EAs attending the events greatly outweighs the spending on the event itself. An argument could also be formed on the basis that such events might only be held a few times a year.

However, with spending running into several hundreds of thousands of dollars, it still seems to me that the money that could be saved counterfactually by not spending so much on extremely upscale event features could still do a lot more good if put into more ‘direct’ impact work (say, into creating a new longtermist research position at a thinktank). I would like to hear others’ thoughts on expanding these arguments or pursuing new ones.