EA - The billionaires’ philanthropy index by brb243

Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: The billionaires’ philanthropy index, published by brb243 on March 29, 2023 on The Effective Altruism Forum.SummaryI made a spreadsheet that allows anyone to find who of the about 2,500 billionaires donates most and least consistently with the user’s personal values (roughly, records might be inaccurate or incomplete).The billionaires’ philanthropy index indexes billionaires’ philanthropy based on the causes they donated to and the amounts they pledged. It displays top donors using up to 52 user’s inputs of their relative valuation of contribution to/impact in 12 cause areas divided into subcategories. It is possible to account for developed/developing country impact cost differential.This post displays billionaires’ philanthropy summary statistics. I also discuss the limitations of the indexing method and suggest improvements. Information about possible partnerships with billionaires’ foundations in EA-popular fields is included. For inspiration, I am providing personal value inputs that an individual involved in Effective Altruism can have, alongside with these values’ ITN-based calculation and reasoning.The three documents shared are:The billionaires’ philanthropy indexUser manual to The billionaires’ philanthropy indexValue examples for The billionaires’ philanthropy indexSuperlinear contestThis submission is for the Superlinear Create 'The Good Billionaires Index' contest.I was awarded ⅔ of the prize for partially completed work. ⅓ could be remaining (if the prize is listed on Superlinear) for someone who makes the user interface more friendly. Feel free to use the material for this purpose, but do not use fear-, power-, or impulse-based marketing.It was suggested that the material is open for comments.Notes on terminology and purposeI use “donate,” “pledge,” and “donate or pledge” (and similar expressions) interchangeably.I use “subcategory” and “minor category” interchangeably.This piece, the index, the manual, and the value examples are for entertainment purposes only. Nothing in any of these resources constitutes a donation, career, investment/divestment, or any other advice.Data sourcesThe main sources of data are:Forbes Real-Time BillionairesGiving PledgeThe full list of data sources for each column/cell can be found in the “Calculations” tab of the index.Research methodologyCopied and pasted the Real-Time Billionaires Forbes list into SheetsRecorded each billionaire’s donations based on their Forbes profile and additional research, if the profile indicated or hinted philanthropic interests but did not specify donationsAdded pledge information based on the Giving Pledge Signatory lettersChecked whether any major donations are omitted on top donor lists, including those of Wikipedia, Forbes (2, 3), The Borgen Project, and The New Humanitarian. Added these donations.Donation categoriesI categorized each billionaire's donations, if any.I used 13 major categories and 4 different subcategory lists.The total in all major categories and any subcategory list is 100.The value assigned to each category or subcategory represents the number of percent of the billionaire’s total donations provided to that category or subcategory (see the example further below).Major categoriesEducationHealthEconomic/social empowermentEnvironmental causesAnimal welfareArt/cultureReligious causesPolitical causesDisaster reliefLocal causesMeta charityFraudOtherMinor category listsGeographical location listEach major category, except Meta charity, Fraud, and Other, is subdivided into 3 geographical locations:USNon-US developedDevelopingEducation subcategory listIn addition, education is categorized as either:HigherK-12Health subcategory listHealth donations can support either:Physical healthMental healthAnimal welfare subcategory ...