Written by Eric Neyman, in my personal capacity. The views expressed here are my own. Thanks to Zach Stein-Perlman, Jesse Richardson, and many others for comments.

Over the last several years, I’ve written a bunch of posts about politics and political donations. In this post, I’ll tell you about one of the best donation opportunities that I’ve ever encountered: donating to Alex Bores, who announced his campaign for Congress today.

If you’re potentially interested in donating to Bores, my suggestion would be to:

1. Read this post to understand the case for donating to Alex Bores.
2. Understand that political donations are a matter of public record, and that this may have career implications. Decide if you are willing to donate to Alex Bores anyway.
3. If you would like to donate to Alex Bores: donations today, Monday, Oct 20th, are especially valuable. You can donate at this link.

Or if [...]

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Outline:

(01:16) Introduction

(04:55) Things I like about Alex Bores

(08:55) Are there any things about Bores that give me pause?

(09:43) Cost-effectiveness analysis

(10:10) How does an extra $1k affect Alex Bores' chances of winning?

(12:22) How good is it if Alex Bores wins?

(12:54) Direct influence on legislation

(14:46) The House is a first step toward even more influential positions

(15:35) Encouraging more action in this space

(16:20) How does this compare to other AI safety donation opportunities?

(16:37) Comparison to technical AI safety

(17:28) Comparison to non-politics AI governance

(18:25) Comparison to other political opportunities

(19:39) Comparison to non-AI safety opportunities

(21:20) Logistics and details of donating

(21:24) Who can donate?

(21:34) How much can I donate?

(23:16) How do I donate?

(24:07) Will my donation be public? What are the career implications of donating?

(25:37) Is donating worth the career capital costs in your case?

(26:32) Some examples of potential donor profiles

(30:34) A more quantitative cost-benefit analysis

(32:33) Potential concerns

(32:37) What if Bores loses?

(33:21) What about the press coverage?

(34:09) Feeling rushed?

(35:16) Appendix

(35:19) Details of the cost-effectiveness analysis of donating to Bores

(35:25) Probability that Bores loses by fewer than 1000 votes

(38:37) How much marginal funding would net Bores an extra vote?

(40:42) Early donations help consolidate support

(42:47) One last adjustment: the big tech super PAC

(45:25) Cost-benefit analysis of donating to Bores vs. adverse career effects

(45:40) The philanthropic benefit of donating

(46:32) The altruistic cost of donating

(48:18) Cost-benefit analysis

(49:01) Caveats

The original text contained 14 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

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First published:

Source:

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.