Ulf Graf 🔹
Bio
Participation2
I am a lecturer in public health at Halmstad University, Sweden. Since 2019, I have been helping Happier Lives Institute. My main interests are system change, tax policy, global health and public health. At the moment I am writing a draft about EA System Change.
How others can help me
Help me start EA System Change.
How I can help others
I am good at finding articles, I have much knowledge about public health and I have quite many connections in the EA community. I am also doing a little research and I have knowledge about things that may not be very common in the EA community. E.g. welfare systems, income equality, global mental health and so on. So I would gladly help if you need it!
Posts 3
Comments20
Thank you, I am happy that it was helpful! I am just an ordinary university teacher without a PhD so it was the first time someone called me professor! :) I wish you luck with finding the right path for you! No matter what path you choose, I think you will do great things and have a large impact! :)
Thank you for your post! I will try to give you as good advice as I can. I teach public health at a university in Sweden so I am a little biased towards global health probably.
Depending on you think is interesting and meaningful, you should choose what you like. As you are good at math, maybe statistics or health economics is a good way for you? I think that no matter what cause area you choose, it is probably good to be able to make a cost-effectiveness analysis.
Do you want to start your own organisation or choose an already existing? Volunteering at an organisation or in the effective altruism community might be more important than what education you choose. Your skills and motivation is very important. One skill that might be good in the future is to apply for grants... If it is something you like, of course. I chose to become an university teacher, since I think that I will have many students who are more capable of making great things than I am, but I can give them the tools. I think it is the advice I would give a younger version of myself. But what you think makes you and your skills unique and what you think is fun and important is what matters most. You already have the EA mindset so whatever path you choose will probably be great! :)
Kind regards,
Ulf Graf
I gave input to the UN together with Cool Earth, Equal Right and Professor Robert Fletcher. During 2025 I will try to figure out what to do with that text (any suggestions are warmly welcome): https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uAzSycfm190C1hnVDCnYTXK2d1tvw0WsbfE8RJYvw2U/edit?usp=drivesdk
I will also try to figure out how I can start a PhD in a meaningful research project. I am stuck in the southern Sweden because I have my family here, but at the university where I work as a lecturer in public health, there are not many research projects that feels right / impactful enough. The next best thing would be to collaborate more with EA people at other universities. I will also book meetings with some people from the EAG online conference, now that I have more time to spare.
Thank you for this post! I think it might be beneficial in some ways for the EA movement but a barrier in other ways. It is quite hard to find good evidence for cost-effectiveness of systemic changes, which makes it hard to look closer into. It is also hard to separate systemic change from politics, which can create tensions in a community.
Well… I am involved. I made some input to the UN together with Cool Earth, Equal Right and Robert Fletcher: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uAzSycfm190C1hnVDCnYTXK2d1tvw0WsbfE8RJYvw2U/edit?usp=drivesdk
I also made a forum post about a way forward that I think might work when it comes to systemic change and the EA community: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/tAF4zQSfDGpABLCaH/green-basic-income-and-health-taxes-as-a-way-for-systemic
Cool Earth is an organisation that was very popular in the EA movement for a while and I think they work with the topics you are looking for. I think GiveDirectly also is doing it. There are also some people doing it loosely. EA Germany has a Slack channel for systemic change.
I hope this helps! You are welcome to contact me if you want to discuss this further!
Kind regards, Ulf Graf
I just want to thank you for such an impressive forum post! I think Shrimp Welfare is very interesting and it has been an eye-opener for me when it comes to animal welfare. My own area is global / public health in different forms, but I will use some of the examples mentioned here in my lectures about global health and economic evaluations for my students if it is okay for you? I think it might be an eye-opener for some of them as well.
Thank you for an interesting forum post! In my forum post I present some examples of how to decrease inequality by using taxes and basic income. The best examples there are safety income and basic income that is funded with environmental taxes.
All the best,
Ulf Graf
Thank you for your wise reply, again! Yes, that is true. Even if we stopped all CO2-emissions now, almost none of the existing would go away because it will be up there for such a long time. But methane vanishes more quickly.
Yes, you are correct here as well. Organizations like Future Matters, that is founded by EA people, are doing research and strategy consulting services in policy, politics, coalitions and movements. So they could use this kind of article, since they give advice to politicians and national policy makers. But I still think that taxes is an underestimated tool in the EA community, because even if e.g. innovation support probably is more effective when it comes to climate change, taxes can be used for reducing poverty, health problems and so on.
Thank you Jackva, you have very wise input. I would also want the most impactful long-term policies as well. I think that the climate change already have gone so far that we need quite much focus on the short-term. For example, UNEP estimates that 25 to 50 % of all coral reefs are already destroyed, mostly because of global warming, and 70 to 90 % will be gone if we reach 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. Many of your suggestions are good for both short-term and long-term impact so I agree that it could be better than the policies in the article. Policies like regulations and pricing may have long-term consequences as well since they have been reducing the amount of CO2 for many years, but policies like these may not be stable over time because of political decisions. But e.g. innovation-support, as you mentioned, probably have more stability.
I think that we should aim for using evidence based on reality and not try to change our ways because we want to appeal to different political groups. That doesn't mean that we can find cause areas that are more interesting for different political groups. I guess that many conservatives might be skeptical to some paths in the EA movement that involves areas like animal welfare, climate change and raising some types of taxes and health policies (e.g. the Swedish right actively work against climate change mitigation, animal welfare and health policies), which some EA organisations promote.
But as many people have pointed out already in the comments, there are many interesting areas for conservatives as well and I think we should welcome people on different parts of the political spectrum. Since the EA community is very left leaning, I think it might be easier to recruit people from the left. The problem there is that the left might be skeptical to EA because of the lack of focus on systemic change or welfare systems. But I think that the Effective Institutions Project and Effective Environmentalism might be able to reduce that kind of critique in the future.