EA - Difficult to get a job in EA not living in the West? Animal advocacy careers can impact millions of animals anywhere in the world by Animal Advocacy Careers

Welcome 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: Difficult to get a job in EA not living in the West? Animal advocacy careers can impact millions of animals anywhere in the world, published by Animal Advocacy Careers on September 13, 2023 on The Effective Altruism Forum.Some effective altruists focus on their donations, or just follow EA as a matter of intellectual pursuit. But for those who want to do direct work in an organisation, finding a job is not usually easy. This is also a big reason why a lot of people simply do not even consider looking for a job in an EA organisation in the first place.We think that a considerable number of effective altruists who couldn't or didn't even try to get a job in EA organisations (due to high competition, lack of expertise, or distant location) may be overlooking extremely impactful career opportunities in animal advocacy. In this post, we'll show how these career opportunities might be a good fit for many effective altruists that experience similar difficulties and bottlenecks in their career.We are not claiming that effective altruists should necessarily pursue a job in EA organisations, or stop looking for jobs in other EA cause areas, or prioritise animal advocacy over other causes or vice versa. Nor do we suggest that animal advocacy is inherently easier or that people should invariably pick more convenient options. Our goal is to simply point out additional possibilities for those who may be a good (or even better) fit for them.Challenges in securing EA jobsIt is not easy to get a job in the EA space, especially if you don't have the right qualifications or live in high income countries.While 80,000 Hours constantly updates EAs with hundreds of new roles in its job board, there are hundreds of thousands of people who apply for these roles too. As a result of this high demand, most hiring rounds are extremely competitive, which lowers the probability of getting hired.In addition, regardless of the competitive nature of these jobs, required or desired qualifications are sometimes quite high and specific. For example, many AI safety positions typically require qualifications related to computer science and programming, while pandemic preparedness positions may require qualifications related to medicine or governance, and so forth.While this doesn't imply that these fields exclude job opportunities for other skill sets, the available positions are limited and extremely competitive due to the sheer number of applicants.On top of these challenges, geographical constraints can complicate matters. While some job opportunities are remote, most are not. Unless you are willing to relocate and have working permits, these job postings do not really count as opportunities.This can be especially true for people who do not live in high income countries.For those in countries like Australia or Germany, obtaining work permits for the US or the UK may be relatively easier. However, it's not as simple for individuals residing in places like Peru, Thailand or Türkiye (previously Turkey). Moreover, demonstrating your credentials can be comparatively tougher if you were born and raised in developing countries, as educational institutions or domestic firms may lack international recognition.This is not to say that it is impossible to get a job in EA organisations, or that you should simply give up. Regardless of the challenges, you may very well overcome them and it may be worth it, especially considering the potential for meaningful impact. We are just describing how difficult it can be. And our guess is that this is how at least some people in the community experience their pursuit of jobs in the EA space (or the lack of it due to these high challenges).There are high impact opportunities available in the animal advocacy spaceIn the animal advocacy field, there are numerous hi...