Better vaguely right than precisely wrong in effective altruism: the problem of marginalism

Economics and Philosophy 39 (1):152-169 (2023)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Effective altruism (EA) requires that when we donate to charity, we maximize the beneficial impact of our donations. While we are in broad sympathy with EA, we raise a practical problem for EA, which is that there is a crucial empirical presupposition implicit in its charity assessment methods which is false in many contexts. This is the presupposition that the magnitude of the benefits (or harms) generated by some charity vary continuously in the scale of the intervention performed. We characterize a wide class of cases where this assumption fails, and then draw out the normative implications of this fact.

Author Profiles

Bastian Steuwer
Ashoka University
Nicolas Cote
University of Glasgow

Analytics

Added to PP
2022-05-31

Downloads
401 (#56,896)

6 months
79 (#71,640)

Historical graph of downloads since first upload
This graph includes both downloads from PhilArchive and clicks on external links on PhilPapers.
How can I increase my downloads?