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Comment by gruez | Hacker News Reader

>So then the question is, what relatively expensive thing could I do that would solve a lot of problems? That would make a lot of lives better?

I'm pretty sure effective altruists have the same question, crunched the numbers, and figured out it was something like malaria nets or similar interventions in developing countries.

Even if you limit the set of possible projects to things that affect your local community, investing in public housing is probably bad bang/buck ratio given how much capital it takes (ie. hundreds of thousands) to help one family. Job training programs, micro loans, or funding YIMBY campaigns probably provide larger benefit.

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I'm skeptical of that, in part because I think the data you get out of e.g. job training programs is so messy.

Let's say instead of building houses, I invest the money in job training and crime intervention programs. Maybe employment goes up and crime goes down. Maybe it doesn't. And even if the numbers move in the correct direction, it is extremely difficult to quantify how much I helped versus external variables outside my control. I'd need a team of data scientists just to quantify how much I helped. And at the end of the day, I am still only helping the subset of people for whom those kinds of programs actually can help.

The nice thing about housing and feeding people is that it directly addresses the base of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. You can be 100% certain that you are helping. And you can be 100% certain you are helping almost everyone. Everyone needs food and shelter. Not everyone needs job training.

Maybe I overvalue simplicity and certainty, maybe I'm overthinking it. Maybe there is just something appealing about just directly addressing a need.

>Let's say instead of building houses, I invest the money in job training and crime intervention programs. Maybe employment goes up and crime goes down. Maybe it doesn't. And even if the numbers move in the correct direction, it is extremely difficult to quantify how much I helped versus external variables outside my control. I'd need a team of data scientists just to quantify how much I helped. And at the end of the day, I am still only helping the subset of people for whom those kinds of programs actually can help.

If you have "untold billions" to spend, you can probably spend a few million on data scientists to make sure you're spending your money as effectively as possible. Moreover, impact shouldn't be hard to measure with RCTs (ie. only helping half of the neighborhoods and comparing it to the other half).

>The nice thing about housing and feeding people is that it directly addresses the base of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. You can be 100% certain that you are helping. And you can be 100% certain you are helping almost everyone. Everyone needs food and shelter. Not everyone needs job training.

Right, but by doing so, you're missing out all the possible higher value interventions, especially ones that aren't applicable to everyone, but would have much greater impact.

> especially ones that aren't applicable to everyone

But the point is that I would be helping nearly everyone. Maybe job training would provide higher "value", however that is measured, but I would be leaving people behind, and that does not sit well with me. In a sense, people for who job training would make a big difference are already better off than the people for whom it wouldn't, even if their life circumstances are more or less identical otherwise.

I mean the real answer is with untold billions I could do both, and while we're dreaming I'd like a pony.

> I'm pretty sure effective altruists have the same question, crunched the numbers, and figured out it was something like malaria nets or similar interventions in developing countries.

I wonder how much real world experience goes into these calculations. For instance the theory of malaria nets can be quite different from reality. From Wikipedia [1]:

> Where mosquito nets are freely or cheaply distributed, local residents sometimes opportunistically use them inappropriately, for example as fishing nets. When used for fishing, mosquito nets have harmful ecological consequences because the fine mesh of a mosquito net retains almost all fish, including bycatch such as immature or small fish and fish species that are not suitable for consumption. In addition, insecticides with which the mesh has been treated, such as permethrin, may be harmful to the fish and other aquatic fauna.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosquito_net#Usage

The Gates Foundation is far more credible than effective altruism, so looking at what they do is instructive.

And they do spend a good chunk of money on housing, but they spend considerably more doing things like trying to eradicate polio.

Which indicates to me that while housing might not be the absolute most effective use of a charity dollar, it's high on the list. That feels about right to me.

I don't necessarily disagree; however, just to continue the thought experiment: Even if housing isn't the most important on a strictly rationalist level, it's possible that the psychological and/or subjective wellbeing effects of having a home make it a good candidate for effective altruism.

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