Hello there,

I'm a fifth year medical student in Cambridge, UK. I have an interest in philosophy and ethics, particularly optimal philanthropy, x-risk, future of humanity stuff, and have gotten involved with Giving What We Can (I was pointed to this forum by Will Crouch, the managing director). However, "interest" does not mean "aptitude", so I apologise for my sophomoric (or soporific) contributions in advance.

Enjoy life,
G

Welcome! I'm in my fourth - and second last - year of medicine at Monash University. I'm pretty interested in becoming a professional donor as suggested by Will Crouch and High Impact Careers. To earn money to donate. But are incomes really higher outside of medicine? I wonder if this is something you've thought about...

A little bit, yes, although all post hoc - I didn't think about this when I applied!

My hunch is medicine is a pretty good career for a professional donor. Although the maximum possible income (at least in the UK) is not as large as a high flying i-banker or commercial lawyer, my understanding is the median income is better. I-banking and other really lucrative careers are highly competitive, and those who aren't the very best get much less well-paying jobs, whilst medicine (once you clear the barrier for entry) pretty much guarantees you an income miles above median of the population even if you're below average. And the skills needed to be good as a doctor are pretty orthogonal to being good as an i-banker, so it is fairly unlikely someone will have both. I haven't properly studied this, so if any of the guys at HIC or similar have and can correct me, please do.

That said, there are two other reasons why I'm staying. First, to do research - medicine is probably a really good idea for those wanting to do research into NTDs or similar, because you earn double-ish what a normal research scientist would. Second, I'm a sucker for akrasia: I strongly doubt that I could hack a high paying job I found extremely unsatisfying, and even more uncertain I would not spend my extra income on consumer goods to make me feel better about my rubbish job then giving it to a worthy cause.

Hi Greg! Welcome et al. Frankly if you have an "interest" that's good enough for me - it's likely aptitude follows from that, certainly we're unlikely to fall asleep.

Second, I'm a sucker for akrasia: I strongly doubt that I could hack a high paying job I found extremely unsatisfying

This is one of my principle concerns about professional philanthropy in the most high paying careers.
I suspect the purchase of more consumer goods doesn't really matter that much. Let's say you can go into two careers, one in which you earn £35,000/yr and spend 50% on charity and one in which you earn £100,000/yr and spend 20% on charity - the latter still wins obviously - even though you're spending vastly more on yourself. In the real world, it might not be so clear cut, obviously.

GregoryLewis wrote:A little bit, yes, although all post hoc - I didn't think about this when I applied!

My hunch is medicine is a pretty good career for a professional donor. Although the maximum possible income (at least in the UK) is not as large as a high flying i-banker or commercial lawyer, my understanding is the median income is better.

I suspect the stability is a big boon, too. You're pretty much guaranteed a job for life, which makes donating higher proportions of your income feel much safer, and means you can find out the threshold income with which you're comfortable and settle into keeping that for yourself - a banker can't afford to do so, since even if he doesn't end up unemployed, his income could fluctuate all over the place.