Suppose that a blind person in a first world country wants help paying for a guide dog and/or wants guide dogs for other blind people in first world countries, but has heard of effective altruism. What honest arguments could the blind person use?
I’m thinking “Increasing independence for blind people in first world countries increases their economic impact, potentially from a net negative to a net positive. It can be expected that some of those blind people will contribute to charities. Information to the blind is often sent through extremely narrow channels controlled by a few organizations, so it would be somewhat trivial to promote EA while paying for guidedogs and associated training, increasing the potential pool of EA donors.”
It has flaws (probably more efficient to uplift the Occupy types by paying off their college debt and simultaneously evangelizing EA; the returns would almost definitely be higher), but that’s the first response that comes to mind.
If the increased economical impact is really likely, the effective altruist could give a loan to the blind person in the first-world country to buy the guide dog, and then donate the returned money to an efficient charity.
I’m thinking “Increasing independence for blind people in first world countries increases their economic impact, potentially from a net negative to a net positive. It can be expected that some of those blind people will contribute to charities. Information to the blind is often sent through extremely narrow channels controlled by a few organizations, so it would be somewhat trivial to promote EA while paying for guidedogs and associated training, increasing the potential pool of EA donors.”
It has flaws (probably more efficient to uplift the Occupy types by paying off their college debt and simultaneously evangelizing EA; the returns would almost definitely be higher), but that’s the first response that comes to mind.
If the increased economical impact is really likely, the effective altruist could give a loan to the blind person in the first-world country to buy the guide dog, and then donate the returned money to an efficient charity.