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Comment by psim1 | Hacker News Reader

As an analytical person I understand the value of maximum economic efficiency and value measured in these terms. On the other hand when it comes to humanitarian concerns, the human element can be somewhat more expensive and less efficient than (for example) airlifted bags of grain, but far more valuable and encouraging to the recipients. Programs like child sponsorship with letter-writing are expensive and not nearly as efficient as straight up meal delivery, but the impact, as evidenced by the children’s handwritten replies, seems to be significant in non tangible ways.

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I don't think GiveWell would rule out a charity because it considers the human element in a way that makes it less economically efficient.

The question is just, is it overall more efficient at broadly "bettering people's lives" in a way they can measure? That's it. If you can show that letter writing is a worthy trade-off by e.g. looking at long-term impacts, I'm sure they'd be for it.

Perhaps you object to the fact that they require measurement. Fair enough, the best things in life are free. But the "bags of grain" (really, "bags of malaria pills") approach is already at a disadvantage to the "give someone a flock of chickens" approach, because the latter tells a story and tugs at our hearts. That doesn't mean it's worse, but I think GiveWell's thesis is, that also doesn't mean it's better.

I think the cannonical "efficient" charity would be incenticide treated bug nets. Against Malaria Foundation distributes them to entire villages, but the largest effect is for children 5 and under, for who catching malaria is much more likely to be fatal.

Grain has some potential negative effects, squashing local food industry, etc, but it's not like domestic bug net companies and a key part of the economy in the same way farming is.

I dunno, I feel like stopping kids from dying is better to focus on first compared to letter writing. But I'm a bit of a Utilitarian, and an aspie, so perhaps I undervalue the human element.

I’m for a both-and approach. But if you can only do one thing, save people through “utilitarian” means.

Absolutely, but the impact is definitely still there and I think we just need better metrics to capture the more complex results. After all, it's likely possible to do child sponsorship well and poorly.

As a side note airlifting in grain in often far more expensive than buying the grain closer to the target area, and causes significant economic harm by putting people employed in farming and the grain supply chain out of work (sometimes the very people the intervention was supposed to help). The main reason we do it is the domestic grain lobby.

> Two-thirds of food for the billion-dollar US food aid programme last year was bought from just three US-based multinationals.

> The main beneficiaries of the programme, billed as aid to the world's poorest countries, were the highly profitable and politically powerful companies that dominate the global grain trade: ADM, Cargill and Bunge.

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2012/jul/18/u...

For-profit capture of foreign aid is a much larger problem. For example, remember the news stories after Trump announced cuts to foreign aid saying many retired generals had signed a letter saying foreign aid was vital to protecting our troops? Most forgot to mention that that letter was organized by a trade organization of big defense contractors that regularly win foreign aid contracts (and employ ex-generals)

https://sites.duke.edu/lawfire/2018/02/21/should-we-be-askin...

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