All of dmolling's Comments + Replies

It seems to depend a lot on what it means for someone to no longer be involved in the EA movement. The relevant alternative in my mind isn't donating nothing.

Speaking for myself I can certainly imagine not being involved in the EA movement in 2-3 years. It's a lot harder to imagine myself raiding a dedicated bank account I had set aside for donations. That doesn't mean it's not possible, but if use the population estimates of not being in the EA movement in 2-3 years of 25-30% (which seems reasonable) as my own risk, I'd estimate ... (read more)

It still seems like it could be worthwhile in the 2-3 year timeline if you were diligent about setting up good systems. I.e. you could set up a separate savings account that you put your yearly (monthly/weekly?) donation into and then donate every 2-3 years.

For me, at least, I think this would do a lot to decrease the cognitive load and temptation to spend. I don't do this currently but am thinking about it. If you can truly think of the money as already donated when in the separate account (maybe a wealth front cash account?) this would solve a lot of the problems. I do think I would end up donating significantly less when bunching if I didn't keep the money separate.

5
Jeff Kaufman
5y
If ~50% of people drift away over five years it's hard to say how many do over 2-3, but it should be at least 25%-35% [1]. You need pretty large tax savings to risk a chance that large of actually donating nothing. [1] 13%/year for five years gives you 50%, and I think I'd expect the rate of attrition to slowly decrease over time? 25% for two years and 35% for three is assuming it's linear.

If you're really worried about value drift, you might be able to use a bank account that requires two signatures to withdraw funds, and add a second signatory whom you trust to enforce your precommitment to donate?

I haven't actually tried to do this, but I know businesses sometimes have this type of control on their accounts, and it might be available to consumers too.

Good point about CS - I should have mentioned that in my post. A lot of economists are starting to dip into machine learning and do some heavy computational stuff where CS background is very useful. Also recommend everything else Howie said as well.

Another point for masters programs, especially for econ masters, is to see if they'll let you take PhD level courses in your second year. If you're very confident in your ability to take a PhD level course year 2 and you do well in it that would greatly increase your odds of getting into a top 6 program (particularly intro PhD microeconomics theory). Doing badly in a PhD level course decreases the odds, of course, so that's a risky path.

3
Howie_Lempel
5y
+1 on taking PhD level economics courses (especially intro micro theory) and doing well on them. Not sure how much it matters where you take those courses but I'd guess high-ranked econ programs would place more weight on courses taken at schools where they expect the PhD courses to be equally challenging.

Quantitative masters are definitely a good path.

I believe the best options are:

1) Master's in statistics. If you don't have a quantitative degree from undergrad, getting into a competitive statistics program may be difficult, though. Most good programs expect at least a semester of linear algebra, multiple calculus courses, and some statistics. But, there are exceptions. The skill overlap between economists and statisticians is pretty large and admission committees love to see applicants with strong stats chops. If you cannot get into a statist... (read more)

Up-voted for interesting idea and for reminding me that Huemer is blogging.

I'd tread very carefully with something as physically and legally dangerous as this (or the black market non-profit), of course, and consult with lawyers before even considering it - maybe something related to this is the reason for the downvotes?

I agree it's a potentially valuable cause, but I think any less dangerous options that would move America towards allowing paid organ donation should obviously be preferred - off the top of my head I'm not sure what that would be, though.

2
Jeremy
5y
Yes that makes sense for sure. Thanks for the feedback.