Doing Good Better

This book delivers exactly what you'd expect. An analytical approach to how to give, ways to give, how to think about the effect of what you give whether it be time or money and how to maximize that. I think it was helpful to shift my view when giving. I normally think about the sectors I am passionate about and used charity navigator to find highly rated non rip off charities in that sector and try to give what I can. While I may not change which sectors I want to give to I may look into giving to the more effective ones in those individual sectors.

This book really helps.

MacAskill aims for something big in this book: convincing people to consider his logical argument when they are making emotional decisions.

Doing Good Better is a manifesto of sorts, aimed at launching the idea of Effective Altruism. He defines the term as “asking, ‘How can I make the biggest difference I can?' and using evidence and careful reasoning to try to find an answer.” (p 11)

The first half of the book is dedicated to exploring five key questions: How many people benefit, and by how much? Is this the most effective thing you can do? Is this area neglected? What would happen otherwise? What are the chances of success, and how good would success be? The second half of the book is about using these questions in specific ways to figure out which organizations one should contribute to, how one should live, and what types of career options one should pursue.

His argument is very convincing, and he makes a compelling point. He might even have convinced me to rethink where I send my charitable donations. But, though he has a solid grasp of classic economics, he gives very little consideration to behavioral economics. He acknowledges that people want to give themselves to organizations that are dear to them. “If a family member died of cancer, isn't it natural to want to direct your energies to fighting cancer?” (pp 40-41) But, he argues, we shouldn't. Instead, “we should focus that motivation on preventing death and improving lives, rather than preventing death and improving lives in one very specific way. Any other decision would be unfair to those whom we could have helped more.” (p 42)

In the second half of the book he argues that being a high-paid stockbroker could actually be more effective at saving lives than being a foreign aid worker, in that having more disposable income and donating large amounts of money to the right organizations (several of which he lists) does more for the world than any individual working in the trenches.

He might be right. but there's a larger problem: Most people feel better about themselves by being face to face with the people they are helping than by writing a check and mailing it off. Most people feel more strongly about problems that affect them directly than about abstract concepts on the other side of the world.

MacAskill acknowledges this problem, but basically believes we should just over-ride these impulses and logically evaluate all of our options. As Benjamin Franklin wrote, “If you would persuade you must appeal to interest rather than intellect.”

]Until he can figure out a way to appeal to our interest (emotional or otherwise) instead of just our intellect, MacAskill might have trouble getting Effective Altruism accepted by most of the world.