EA and the possible decline of the US: Very rough thoughts

Abstract

This post summarizes some thoughts (mostly possible research questions) around the possible collapse, balkanization, or radical transformation of the United States (collectively, “Collapse”). To be clear, I do not think that Collapse is either imminent or likely in the foreseeable future. Nor do I even think that Collapse is probably competitive with other top causes. However, I do think that:

p(Collapse within 50 years) is non-trivial (\textgreater0.5%). The disutility from Collapse could be extreme in certain scenarios.

As EAs, we care about expected utility, so Collapse may well be worth worrying about despite being unlikely. Thus, I think it may be worth some EAs exploring Collapse as a possible cause area. The thoughts here are extremely rough. I normally like to publish stuff that is more polished than this, but I wanted to get this out there and don’t want to invest more in polishing it. I hope others will critique or build on these thoughts. Note that I had been thinking about this subject from an EA perspective the past few weeks, though Wednesday’s riot at the Capitol certainly made me think about this more seriously.