Parth Ahya
@Parthion
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Knowing that earning >$50k/year placed me among the 1% of richest people in the world permanently altered my sense of agency and moral responsibility.
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Some personal news: I am working with @tkalil2050 @KumarAGarg and an incredible group of teammates to launch Renaissance Philanthropy, a new nonprofit that will work with philanthropists to design and implement ambitious efforts leveraging science, technology, and innovation.
I’m excited to announce that I’m launching a new non-profit organization today: Renaissance Philanthropy. Renaissance will work with philanthropists to design and implement ambitious efforts leveraging science, technology, and innovation.
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Want to restore your faith in humanity? Some US recipients of @GiveDirectly cash transfers, living well below the poverty line, ended up donating part of their cash transfer. back to @GiveDirectly
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Properly accounted for, lifting the green card limit for STEM master's and PhD graduates would reduce the federal budget deficit by $129 billion over 10 years and $634 billion over 20 years. Great work by @heidilwilliams_, Doug Elmendorf, @BudgetModel and others.
How do changes in immigration policy affect the federal budget?. At least for STEM advanced degree green cards (e.g. Section 80303, H.R. 4521), different approaches can result in sharply divergent estimates. From Doug Elmendorf and I w/ the Penn Wharton Budget Model (PWBM).
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This chart from @open_phil is wild. Non-communicable diseases like air pollution kill so many people vs what we spend on addressing them (H/T @santoshharish1)
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Social movements like EA and progress studies underrate diversity badly and at the expense of their goals.
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What’re the best maps of the flow of talent in the world? Examples: . - 16,000 HS students earn a 99th percentile SAT score.- 4,500 MIT students graduate every year .- …. What do they end up doing in life?.
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Exciting goal with $100M behind it: "sushi-grade salmon that’s cheaper than a chicken thigh."
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Famous examples of philanthropic success include developing a birth control pill (Katherine McCormick), sparking the green revolution (Rockefeller), and setting up @gavi (Gates). But what about philanthropic failure? When have philanthropists really messed things up?.
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Love being plugged into multiple communities (e.g. Progress Studies, meta science, dev econ, EA, US policy/politics, African tech/politics, etc.) — so many great people with different perspectives 😊.
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A year post moving to DC: I was trying to type “omg” and my phone autocorrected to “OMB.”.
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Good lesson at the end of this Statecraft interview: “To win a policy fight, you have to win the same argument multiple times. and. stay vigilant beyond the regulation or law or front page story, until implementation actually affects people's lives.”.
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My monthly donation for May went to @CGDev. It is harder to visualize the direct impact of my donation, but the folks at CGD do research and advocacy which mobilizes billions behind effective solutions to end global poverty. (@gyude_moore @glassmanamanda @scepticalranil etc).
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Just moved to Washington DC. Excited to join a growing community of earnest, thoughtful, and ambitious policy entrepreneurs here 😊🚀.
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More writers and podcasters should use their platform to issue grand challenges and crowdsource contributions. In addition to @natfriedman and @dwarkesh_sp’s great collaboration on the Scrolls Prize, here is another example from @mattyglesias and @scientistsorg!.
Help the Federation of American Scientists identify policy opportunities for *federal* initiatives to increase housing supply.
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Housing supply elasticity — the degree to which housing supply increases in response to an increase in housing prices — in different “superstar” cities in the US. From an excellent piece by @ebwhamilton on transit-oriented development in DC.
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I feel grateful to know and work with smart and highly competent people dedicated to making the world a better place.
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EAs love multipliers, but two other ideas from EA which I love: . 1. Moral significance is independent of distance and place in time — future people and distant people matter. 2. We can do a profound amount of good for others through our careers — we have agency, and lots of it.
The core idea of #effectivealtruism in a tweet:. How much more effective are the best life saving charities compared to the average?. Most people: 1.5x.Global health experts: 100x.Effective altruists: 100x. & the same applies within other causes
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Great article and quote at the end: "I suspect that the primary thing standing between many more [AMCs] existing is great people willing to run through walls to make them happen. If this resonates with you even a little bit, consider deciding to be one of those people.".
1/ I wrote about how to start an advance market commitment, drawing largely on our experience starting Frontier:.
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One of the most important problems is that currently ~4 billion people live on <$6.70 which is ~1/4th of the US poverty line.
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A good example of policy entrepreneurship in action: an important but very neglected issue can become a priority for the head of the world’s biggest aid funder. Kudos to @CGDev @LeadElimination @PureEarthNow and many others involved.
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I saw this and got jealous, so started organizing one in DC a few months ago (now on its 4th iteration this Sunday). DM me if you're in DC and would like to join!.
Sunday mornings for @joinwritingclub learning and writing together. Hosted at the beautiful @thesfcommons 📖 . 📍Hayes Valley, San Francisco
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@NathanpmYoung Community undervalues representation of perspectives from Africa (e.g. there were <5 Africans to my knowledge at EAG), even though the future of humanity is to a great extent African
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It is wild how we underuse the O-1 visa (90+ percent success rate, no legal cap or per country limits). Kudos to @lisawehden for her work on remedying this! . If you have an idea for what else to do to, there's a Fast Grants program to support you (@FundMobility).
@pika_labs @LangChainAI @midjourney @togethercompute @JCBtaiche10 @saffronhuang @GoogleDeepMind When I eventually received the O1, I decided to help others navigate this path. I wrote an essay on the journey. I met @calebwatney & @AlecStapp from @IFP, who gave me the confidence to launch @plymouthstreet. I’m especially grateful to our additional early backers.
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@paulg Thank you for sharing this and for promoting investment in Nigerian startups! . I’d love to hear more about the potential you see in the market, particularly through the lens of your own or YC’s investments in @tizeti, @thriveagric, @paystack, etc.
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e.g. I caught up with @celinehalioua a year ago and shared how I thought working on policy was the highest-impact thing I could do — her response was “so why aren’t you doing that now?” I moved to DC a couple months ago.
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Has anyone created a list of constraints which limit the adoption of evidence by governments? E.g. regulatory capture, interest groups, limited state capacity, timeliness of relevant information, etc @CorreaDan @notanastronomer @abiylfoyp @srajagopalan @rglenner.
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Part of the central appeal of cities for me is this feeling of awe.
Looking at a crowd of strangers brings me almost as much awe as looking at deep field images of the universe. Every person in the crowd is a galaxy of memories, dreams, hopes, fears, longing, sadness, regret, love.
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Never assume that because a problem is very important and solvable it is therefore being solved.
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A question worth asking is why the world’s largest aid agency, USAID, doesn’t scale proven, cost-effective interventions like those identified by @GiveWell. This is a good first step to change that, but as @e_collinson notes a lot will depend on implementation.
US foreign aid should go to innovative solutions that save lives & transform communities. Today, I'm introducing the Fostering Innovation in Global Development Act (FIGDA) w/@RepYoungKim to give USAID the tools to prioritize innovation in foreign aid. Here's what FIGDA does🧵.
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@tkalil2050 @KumarAGarg I’m excited about this because I believe in the existence of market failures, stubborn problems in the world like childhood lead poisoning and future pandemics which persist because a solution is insufficiently profitable.
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Anyone would be lucky to work with @calebwatney, @AlecStapp and the wonderful team they have built at @IFP!.
Come work with us! IFP is currently hiring for: . - Chief of Staff.- Data Fellow.- Biotechnology Fellow.- Senior Biotechnology Fellow.
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I feel very grateful to work with @KumarAGarg.
“There’s a lot more in the world that is fixable, changeable, shapeable than people realize.”. Schmidt Futures VP of Partnerships, @KumarAGarg, shares his optimism towards solving hard problems. Watch the full interview with @RoadtripNation:.
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There is no substitute for working with people you respect - one of the great joys!.
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The US government should do a $1 trillion advanced market commitment for carbon capture and permanent storage at $100/ton. At that price, we could capture and permanently store 10 billion tons of CO2/year. The US currently emits ~ 6.5 billion tons/year.
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When he was secretary of commerce (1921-1929) Herbert Hoover released the Standard State Zoning Enabling Act, a template for state legislatures to promote municipal zoning. Federal grants were conditioned on adoption of this template. Glad we're now doing the opposite!.
#Omnibus housing news!. -One small discretionary grant program, one giant symbolic leap for YIMBYism at the federal level:. "Race to the Top" style funding for jurisdictions that end exclusionary growth controls
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My mom is a nurse in an ICU ward in South Florida treating COVID patients. Multiple patients died today, some of whom did not have preexisting conditions. Morale was low. So, they decided to sing.
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Good news for the pace of scientific progress - congrats to @AdamMarblestone @MWCvitkovic @AGamick and the team!
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@MatthewTPage Hey Matt! Question: How do you balance Dangote's manipulation of economic policy to benefit his conglomerate with his efforts to promote life saving investments in healthcare?.
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Follow Amy if you want to learn about *things we can do now* to help global STEM talent come/stay in the United States (which is good for the world).
Today, the window for capped H-1B registrations comes to a close & petitions registered by employers will be in a lottery this coming week. Yet, the H-1B is failing to keep up with the needs of the American STEM ecosystem. Fortunately, there are other tools available! 🧵
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Woah! "there are ~1.3B tobacco users. smoking combustible tobacco [is] responsible for some 8 million deaths and ~230M normative disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) . making it a bigger contributor to health damages in our terms than HIV/AIDS plus tuberculosis plus malaria.".
We just published our latest shallow investigation, on the efficacy of different approaches to tobacco control — several of which look promising!.
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@devisridhar Dr. Sridhar, the caseload of COVID is growing in less developed countries, like Burkina Faso. What can private citizens in wealthier countries do to help those in less developed countries?.
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@jasonhickel @MaxCRoser @JKSteinberger Is there any evidence that decommodification of public goods has "significantly [expanded] people's access to the resources they need to live good lives" in the world's poorest countries?. If not, it is troubling that you predicate the end of poverty on such a fragile premise.
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What is an underrated piece of advice for people early in their career?.
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What are other things which have lifted people’s sense of agency? Another is receiving the suggestion to be more ambitious, especially from people you respect.
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Philanthropists should fund the creation and maintenance of maps for important fields (e.g. carbon capture) which include: .- introductory learning resources .- history of the field .- lists of every person in the field and what they are doing .- jobs, grants, conferences, etc.
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Unlike the US, countries like France, Germany, and Japan are actively seeking more immigrants but struggling to do so due to things like not enough fluent speakers of their language. Organizations like @labor_mobility, @malengo, and @GlobalDevInc are working on addressing these.
30,000 Indian students in France in 2030. It’s a very ambitious target, but I am determined to make it happen. Here’s how:
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Excited to see this come to life! An effort to raise the status, legibility, and replicability of policy entrepreneurship.
At @IFP, we’re launching a newsletter!. It’s called Statecraft, and it’s an interview series about how policymakers actually get things done.
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Waking up everyday and refusing to allow your experience of the world to be dulled by irony, insincerity, or cynicism is an act of bravery.
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I feel a lot of gratitude to know/work closely with people who care a lot about helping others.
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Should the federal government have something like an automatic stabilizer for the construction industry (i.e. timed build-outs of public housing which coincide with market downturns)? @JerusalemDemsas @_brianpotter @hanlonbt @johnrmyers.
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@SenWarren @SamanthaJPower @rglenner have each shown how plans, ideas, and rigorous evidence, fought for vigorously, can make a tangible and felt difference in people's lives. The world owes a debt of gratitude to them for their work.
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It saddens me to hear good friends say their path to doing good is becoming a high-flying [lawyer, banker, etc.] & then becoming philanthropists. Their talent, directed tactfully over the course of a lifetime, is (almost always) worth more to the world than $5-10M in donations.
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Meanwhile in 🇺🇸: “the administration and Democratic congressional leaders cut down [a] $30 billion proposal for future pandemic planning that was originally included in the American Jobs Plan.” $30bn was itself a cut from an initial $65bn proposal
Israel Holds ‘War Games’ to Prepare for More Lethal Covid Strain
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Taking a vacation. Can’t wait to fight lots of good fights in 2022 ♥️.
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"One notable advantage of BARDA is that it has Congressional authorization to use a broad suite of innovative procurement models such as prizes, milestone-based awards and payments, advanced market commitments, and funding for university-affiliated research centers.".
Of all our federal biomedical agencies, BARDA proved to be the most capable and useful during the pandemic. Read @DrNikkiTeran on what makes BARDA special and why it needs more funding to lay the groundwork for the future.
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When I first met @quintinfrerichs a few years ago, we talked about extreme pain (cluster headaches, fibromyalgia, etc.) and ways to address it. If you want to work on a team that is both technically excellent and also motivated by impact, check out @nudge.
We’ve got a lot of hard engineering problems and are moving beyond the edge of the known science - reach out!.
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I'll be based in Lagos in Feb/March - excited to meet lots of great people!.
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“When Malaysia or the Dominican Republic reaches upper middle income status, it’s a good thing and a useful success story; if India did the same, it would shake the world.”.
The final post in my "country development" series: India!!! 🇮🇳🇮🇳🇮🇳🇮🇳🇮🇳.
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So impressed by @WalterAKerr and @_AmandaArch.
@SenBooker & @JoaquinCastrotx ask @USAID to scale the most effective innovations supported by the agency’s highly effective #DIV unit, especially those that can help us fight climate change, a global food crisis, and other global challenges. Full letter:.
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It's been great working with @rglenner on standing up @UChi_MSA. I'm excited for that work to continue under her leadership at @CGDev, where it originally started in the mid 2000s!
I am honored and excited to be taking on the role of President of CGD! Looking forward to working with all the brilliant researchers there.
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What an amazing opportunity to work with @Convergent_FROs on starting new research organizations working on everything from measuring agricultural methane emissions to mapping the human brain to automating mathematical proofs. Share with your most talented.
Hey science twitter - come work directly with @AdamMarblestone and explore some of the most interesting projects out there as Chief of Staff.
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One of the most profound things I’ve heard about building products and services for the median person (lives on just above $5/person/day) is that whatever you build is competing with food.
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I guess what I’m more curious about is how countries like India can urbanize (critical for econ growth) without the collapse of extended family and community networks.
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What are examples of non-Western future generation-oriented moral traditions?.
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Ten years from now, these fellows — many of whom will just be starting their careers — will have changed the world ♥️.
*taps mic* . We’re launching a new science & tech policy fellowship to develop pathways for early-career individuals to shape the future in DC!. Come make the world a better, more dynamic place w/ @IFP, @FAScientists, and @JoinLincoln. Apply by May 2nd.
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Congratulations to Schmidt Futures Innovation Fellow @luciacoulter on being nominated for the Pritzker Environmental Genius award. Dr. Coulter is co-founder of Lead Exposure Elimination Project, which aims to reduce childhood lead poisoning in low and middle-income countries.
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@abiylfoyp Sub-field of anthropology focused on societally critical institutions like the NIH.
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Great news! GSK received a first-ever FDA approval for an RSV vaccine for adults over 60, ending half a century of failed efforts. RSV is the second leading cause of death during the first year of a child's life, after malaria.
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Stoked to see that @poverty_action spotlighted our work @TaimakaProject using rigorous evidence to raise the incomes of the poorest households.
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@tkalil2050 @KumarAGarg Philanthropy has an important role to play in addressing these problems. Yet, many donors (even those who have made public commitments) are struggling to give at a pace that results in any net-reduction in their wealth.
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Mumbai has a GDP per capita of $23,000 (PPP), which is >3x the GDP per capita of India as a whole. Is it a good idea to help people move from poorer parts of India to T1 cities like Mumbai, Bangalore, and Delhi, or even T2 cities like Jaipur, Lucknow, and Vadodara?.
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Is there any good research on the impact of rural-urban migration on non-consumption indicators of well-being?.
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I think there's a flip side to the Max Planck quote about how science advances one funeral at a time. The retirement, death or cognitive decline of 1-2 key individuals IMO can be very harmful to small and not-yet-well established fields.
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walk > coffee.
Every meeting that can be a walking meeting should be a walking meeting.
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"Effective city size" refers to the places you can get within half an hour to an hour. Useful concept!
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@tkalil2050 @KumarAGarg Renaissance hopes to plug this gap. Our mission is to fuel a 21st century Renaissance by building a virtuous loop of increasing ambition and impact between philanthropists and the scientific and technical community.
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Every kid, from a young age, should have their ability to materially improve the world affirmed.
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Imagine a project which creates $1 billion in social value. A and B executed the project. C funded the project. Who created how much value? To make it fun let’s assume that, had C not funded the project, no one would have.
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I am hosting a dinner and someone responded to "Any dietary preferences?" on the RSVP form with "open" and I love that energy.
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"Emergent Ventures. selects and rewards earnestness. Maybe because few other things in life reward this, earnest people are so delighted to be recognized that they can’t help but refer friends.".
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@jasonhickel @MaxCRoser @JKSteinberger Sure poverty is multidimensional and not fully captured by consumption. But even the non-income dimensions of poverty are a function of productivity, which to a great extent determines the capacity of governments to deliver non-commodified public goods.
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