Expected-Value Giving
Apply the scientific method to philanthropy to buy the most impact per dollar
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 85%
Effective altruism, as Boeree frames it, is the scientific method applied to philanthropy. Because we cannot fix every problem, we must triage: weigh causes by how many are affected, whether we can genuinely help, and how neglected the problem is, then allocate to whatever yields the highest expected impact per unit of resource. Concrete anchors keep it honest — roughly $4,000-$5,000 donated to a top charity saves a life on expectation — so a giver can compare options the way a poker player compares bets by return on investment. The mindset extends beyond money to how you spend career hours and attention, always asking which allocation does the most good on expectation rather than which one feels most compelling in the moment.
Origin
Boeree and her partner Igor encountered effective altruism around 2014, introduced by fellow players and a group of Swiss philosophers researching the most cost-effective charities. They realised poker players already thought in ROI terms and co-founded Raising for Effective Giving to bring the method to the poker community.
Core principles
- 01Resources — money, time, attention — are limited, so problems must be triaged not solved all at once
- 02Rank causes by scale (how many affected), tractability (can we actually help), and neglectedness (how urgent and uncrowded)
- 03Follow the evidence on cost-effectiveness even when it overrides emotional pull
- 04Think in expected value: on average $4,000-$5,000 to the right charity saves a life
- 05It is the same return-on-investment mindset a poker player uses at the table
How to run it
- 1
Accept the constraint
Recognise that money, time and brainpower are finite, so every cause can't be funded at once and prioritisation is unavoidable.
- 2
Score scale
For each candidate cause, estimate how many people or beings it affects and how severely.
- 3
Score tractability
Ask whether your contribution can realistically make a measurable difference to the problem.
Pro tip A huge problem you can't move may score lower than a smaller, solvable one.
- 4
Score neglectedness
Weigh how urgent the problem is and how much attention and funding it already receives.
Pro tip Neglected, tractable causes often have the most impact per dollar.
- 5
Allocate to highest expected value
Direct resources to the option with the best expected impact per unit, and commit a fixed share of your income or time.
Pro tip A standing percentage pledge beats one-off emotional giving.
Watch out Don't let a vivid single story override the cost-effectiveness evidence.
In the wild
Boeree, Igor, Philipp and Stefan founded Raising for Effective Giving, where poker players pledged to donate at least 2% of winnings to the most cost-effective charities. Framing giving as ROI resonated with a community already fluent in expected value. By the time it sunsetted around 2019 it had moved roughly $14 million to high-impact charities — counterfactual money that otherwise wouldn't have been given — and inspired Dan Smith's Double Up Drive, which moved over $20 million more.
→ ~$14M redirected to top charities, plus a spin-off moving $20M+.
Common mistakes
Letting proximity beat evidence
Giving to whatever tugs your heartstrings can save far fewer lives than the same money sent to an evidence-backed charity.
Waiting for certainty before acting
Expected-value giving works on probabilities; refusing to give until impact is guaranteed means never giving at all.
Is it for you?
Best for
Anyone deciding where to direct charitable money, career effort, or discretionary time for maximum impact.
Not ideal for
Situations where the emotional or relational meaning of a gift is the actual point rather than measurable impact.
From the transcript
“effective altruism is essentially just that process of trying to use logic and reason to figure out how to best allocate resources... it's like the…”
“for every roughly around four thousand five thousand dollars you donate say to Against Malaria Foundation you on expectation save a literal life”
From the episode
Liv Boeree: Poker Rules Of Life, Game Theory, AI & Effective Altruism
Liv Boeree