> A bloated public sector is not evidence that collective assistance is bad, it is not. In the example I gave above, local information suggests to simply not he

> A bloated public sector is not evidence that collective assistance is bad, it is not. In the example I gave above, local information suggests to simply not help the homeless, but global information finds that housing them cuts the costs and improves the situation for everyone. This is more nuanced than you seem to suggest. It is for me evident that if collective assistance through coactive systems have a lot of the incentives shifted or reversed (you manage but do not suffer consequences, for example), then what will happen is that resources will not be used well and... it happens all the time! So for me this is clearly evidence. > The aim of effective altruism is to maximise the net impact of individual people’s charity by avoiding giving money to bad ones And the aim of communism is that we are all equal and everyone works for the good of all the others. Now tell me where you saw that. Even with the use of coaction was a failure... Intentions can be whatever you want, what counts is the results. A system where incentives are not aligned (as in compatible) with human nature are a recipe for failure. It is of paramount importance that if there is research in the psychology field that says that if you collectivize responsibility noone takes care efficiently or just start to ignore the problems, then the logical step is to put more self-reliance and concrete reponsibles for things, to give just an example. Incentives must make sense or things do not work, that is what historic data taught us. > Still, EA does not have the capacity to see the complete picture because it still lacks data and can not organise large scale operations across multiple sectors whereas individual charities are very limited in scope I do not see the problem in gathering public information and adapting to the market needs. A state has to emit laws, is rigid, do giant budgets and moves slow. In the time a state moves, private companies do so several times faster. Shetty hospitals example: did anyone try something like that before? No that I know of. Why? Because the incentive of the state is to justify tax paying and education and health care are two of their biggest justifications. If someone comes to show they are doing it wrong that talks very bad about states, indeed, and people will start to think it is a scam to pay a health care that is three or four times more expensive when they can have a similar one cheaper. At this time there is a big reason to move the state away from that sector unless they compete with the same rules.