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[anonymous]1
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Maybe reach out to new institutions, possibly via Linkedin, even if they don't have job opportunity listings, as they might find that it would take too long to make those listings, are too busy, or might not have listed them for other reasons. It also likely heavily reduces competition.

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by levav ferber tas
3 min read 3

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TL;DR

  • Experience in Math, Datascience, small non-profit management
  • I care about people and suffering
  • Prefer intervention through removing bad actors
  • Not sure how to do that, Lobbying? 
  • Please send me potential jobs and internships

Introduction

Hi everyone, thank you for taking the time to read & help! 

I’m very new to EA and new to looking for 3rd sector jobs, so please feel free to send information I didn’t explicitly request & give constructive criticism :)

Short CV

Professional work

  • Bachelor of mathematics from TAU
  • Two years total of data science (internships)
  • One year of firmware optimization (internship)
  • Two years of cyber security systems integration (pre-uni)

Volunteer work

  • Five years on board of directors of the Israeli Go Association (four years as head)
  • One year of volunteer work for the Association for LGBTQ equality in Israel

Other skills

  • Fluent Hebrew and English, competent Dutch
  • Conducting research, writing and debating.

Example areas I care about

  1. Direct systemic violence (war, genocide, slavery)
  2. Global warming
  3. Global health

Why direct systemic violence is first on the list

I simply put a huge weight on the amount of mental suffering that comes together with such violence.

What I mean by “bad actors”

Any person or organization that creates harm for their own gain. This could be political leaders, religious leaders or companies.

Some unordered notable examples

  • Ethiopian leaders in the Tigray war
  • Chinese leaders in the context of Xinjiang
  • Owners of some private prisons in the US
  • Nestle in the context of child labor
  • ExxonMobil in the context of climate change denial and policy manipulation

Why focus on removing bad actors?

Personal POV

The frustration I feel with bad actors is to me a much stronger motivator than the pain and suffering alone.

I’ll refrain from considering why here ;)

EA POV

Bad actors take attention away from important problems, through misinformation and lobbying. This removes a great amount of financial support from non-EA members for EA causes. 

A clear example here is ExxonMobile’s influence on conventional climate change conversations and policy.

Considering the amount of resources non-EA members bring it seems worthwhile to spend effort on where those resources go. 

If you have any research about the negative impact of such actors, I would love to read it ;)

How to remove bad actors?

I don’t know. I would love to see more research on any of the following points.

My current understanding and thoughts:

  • The case of states
    • Sanctions seem to be mostly ineffective and are often harmful
    • Peaceful protest seems mostly ineffective
    • Violent protest seems to be a coinflip between effective and harmful
    • Lobbying seems effective but requires a lot of pre-existing power
  • The case of companies
    • Bad press seems to be a coinflip in the current political climate
    • The current laws don’t seem to be doing much

What would I prefer to do?

work with people for at least a large part of the day. That means less programming and mathematical research and more management or anything else that leads to a lot of conversations (right now my only idea is lobbying, other ideas are very welcome).

I do realize this is a tall order with my CV, so anything that would combine my strong suits with what I want to do, or would help me transition is more than welcome.

Geographic limitations:

  • I will be moving from Israel to South Korea in two months and will probably stay there for 1-2 years. I’m guessing that means I’ll have to do remote work, I do realize how this clashes with what I want.
  • I don’t have authorization to work in the US which seems to be a requirement for a lot of (even remote) jobs.

What did I try?

I’ve tried going through organization lists and seeing which has openings, I’ve tried using the 80,000 hours jobs board. 

I’ve seen that I simply do not qualify for most jobs, and that I have a hard time judging how relevant different jobs are to me.

How can you help?

  • Send jobs/ internships my way.
  • Send relevant research to the points above.
  • Give me feedback on anything! My reasoning, the style of this post etc…

 

Thank you so much for taking the time to read! 





 

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Peter Wildeford11
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I don’t have authorization to work in the US which seems to be a requirement for a lot of (even remote) jobs.

Rethink Priorities (my company) hires remotely from nearly anywhere and do not need US work authorization, so it could be a good option for you. We will have many open roles soon that you may be interested in.

One thing is that we do not work much at all on "Direct systemic violence" and "bad actors". We do work on global warming and global health though.

While we're working on opening the roles we have an expression of interest form for fellowships as well as just a general expression of interest form for a job at Rethink Priorities.

If you sign up for our newsletter or follow us on social media (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn) you can get notified about all our job openings as they happen.

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levav ferber tas1
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Thank you! I've read up on Rethink and it definitely seems interesting, I'll do a formal expression of interest soon ^^

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[anonymous]1
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Maybe reach out to new institutions, possibly via Linkedin, even if they don't have job opportunity listings, as they might find that it would take too long to make those listings, are too busy, or might not have listed them for other reasons. It also likely heavily reduces competition.

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