Hello, EA Forum! Here is an open thread.
I will kick it off by asking what thoughts people have on saving for retirement while donating more than a set 10% of income.
I am likely to have a relatively high paying job within a few months and don't plan on spending most of that income. I plan to divide the rest between retirement savings and donations to x-risk charities, but I don't have a coherent framework for balancing the creation of passive income with helping preserve the world.
Ideas on utilizing less-taxed retirement accounts would be appreciated as well. Are there any advantages over DAFs?
| It just seems rather implausible, to me, that retirement money is anywhere close to being a cost-effective intervention, relative to other likely EA options.
I don't think that "Give 70-year-old Zach a passive income stream" is an effective cause area. It is a selfish maneuver. But the majority of EAs seem to form some sort of boundary, where they only feel obligated to donate up to a certain point (whether that is due to partially selfish "utility functions" or a calculated move to prevent burnout). I've considered choosing some arbitrary method of dividing income between short term expenses, retirement and donations, but I am searching for a method that someone considers non-arbitrary, because I might feel better about it.
Apologies, rereading it again, I think my first comment was rude. :/
I do a lot of selfish and suboptimal things as well, and it will be inefficient/stressful if each of us have to always defend any deviation from universal impartiality in all conversations.
I think on the strategic level, some "arbitrariness" is fine, and perhaps even better than mostly illusory non-arbitrariness. We're all human, and I'm not certain it's even possible to really cleanly delineate how much you value different satisfying different urges for a meaningful and produ... (read more)