Effective Ventures

Legal name: Effective Ventures Foundation USA Inc

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
471988398
IRS 990 coverage
2015–2024
Official website data refreshed
Sep 2026
Forms available
Form 990 2024, Form 990-EZ 2014, Form 990-N 2016
Location
Oxford, Oxfordshire, United Kingdom
Phone
4159076452
Rating
79
Verdict
SUPPORTED
Rating confidence
Moderate
Sector
Research Institutes and/or Public Policy Analysis

Official website

Reported finances

Revenue
$23,675,475
Expenses
$32,404,027
Assets
$23,194,275
Liabilities
$1,617,558

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.

Leadership & pay

14 people listed

Executive titles in this filing

  • ZACHARY ROBINSON (PRESIDENT & CEO)

Highest reported compensation

  • ZACHARY ROBINSON (PRESIDENT & CEO): $383,122 total reported compensation
  • KATHLEEN PERELL SECRETARY (UNTIL DEC 2024, GENERAL COUNSEL): $248,786 total reported compensation
  • MIRIAM RODGERS (SECRETARY, ASSISTANT GENERAL COUNSEL): $229,847 total reported compensation

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.

Overview

Mission

Effective Ventures is a federation of organisations and projects working to have a large positive impact in the world.

What it reported doing in 2024

80,000 hours provides research and support to help people enter careers that effectively tackle the world's most pressing problems by providing 1-on-1 career advising, as well as maintaining a blog, a podcast, and a curated job board of high-impact opportunities. The forethought foundation aims to promote and communicate academic and nonacademic work that addresses the question of how to use our scarce resources to improve the world as much as possible. Forethought supports and promotes individuals and institutions working on global priorities research, furthers and develops effective altruism and longtermism ideas, and promotes and presents the ideas of effective altruism and long-termism in social and traditional media, in person, and within academia. The centre for the governance of ai ("gov ai") aims to define and map the field of artificial intelligence (ai) governance and address the most important and neglected research questions. Gov ai fellowships and prizes support promising early-career researchers working on ai governance. Gov ai runs seminars and conferences to connect the field of ai governance better and build a thriving global research community.

Operating model

Revenue model
Donor-supported. 95% of the money available for current operations came from contributions and gifts.
Distribution model
Hybrid. The nonprofit split its reported program spending across 42% for direct work, and 58% for grants.
  • Includes noncash contributions: Reported contributions include donated property or goods.

The verdict

SUPPORTED - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. A relatively small share of voting board members are independent and the filing reports few safeguards for money sent abroad.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 97
  • Transparency & Controls: 69
  • Accountability: 66
  • Sustainability: 21
  • Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 100%; rating input score 100
  • Program expense ratio: 92.7%; rating input score 93
  • Fundraising efficiency: $667.46 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 95; 95th percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 93.8%; rating input score 94; 17th percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: 1 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 17
    • Compensation committee: Missing
    • Independent consultant: Missing
    • Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
    • Written employment contract: Missing
    • Compensation survey or study: Missing
    • Board or committee approval: Pass
  • Foreign activity oversight: 4 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 50
    • Claims monitoring procedures: Pass
    • Requires narrative reports: Pass
    • Conducts field audits: Fail
    • May suspend future funding: Fail
    • Requires financial reports: Fail
    • Conducts site visits: Fail
    • Requires grant agreements: Pass
    • May require repayment: Pass
  • Grant itemization coverage: 100%; rating input score 100; 72nd percentile among comparable filings
  • Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
  • Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

  • Independent voting board: 50%; rating input score 50; 8th percentile among comparable filings
  • Governance controls: 8 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 89
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Pass
    • Document-retention policy: Pass
    • CEO compensation review process: Pass
    • Other executive compensation review process: Pass
    • Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
    • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
    • Audit committee oversight: Fail
    • Independent financial-statement audit: Pass

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: -36.9%; rating input score 2; 2nd percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.72; rating input score 25; 25th percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.07; rating input score 79; 79th percentile among comparable filings
  • Officer compensation ratio: 7.7%; rating input score 32; 32nd percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 27.5% per year; rating input score 100; 94th percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: 22.5% per year; rating input score 100; 94th percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 23.6% per year; rating input score 100; 92nd percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • What they do: 1 programs and campaigns described on the official site · 3 operating locations identified
  • Where the money goes: 100% of revenue deployed · 92.7% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 2 of 4 board members independent · 8 of 9 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 4 filed program accomplishments · $30M in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $383K · 14 people listed · 1 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
  • Highest-paid contractors: 5 contractors listed · $908K reported
  • Consistency: 37 of 39 current checks pass · 2 findings to review
  • Schedules: 10 filed schedules · includes major donors, foreign activity, grants, and executive pay
  • Filing history: 10 filing years from 2015 to 2024
  • Contacts: How to reach this organization
  • Money network: 60 filed money-flow records
  • Related organizations: 49 filed related-organization links
  • Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
  • People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.
  • Staff and benefit plans: Retirement and health plans the organization files with the Department of Labor, and the people in them.

Key Signals

Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.

  • Review — Accountability: Independent voting board scored 50/100.
  • Review — Transparency & Controls: Foreign activity oversight: 4 of 8 not reported.
  • High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 2/100.
  • High — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 25/100.
  • Review — Accountability: Governance controls: Audit committee oversight not reported.
  • Moderate — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 32/100.
  • Review — Transparency & Controls: Domestic grant itemization did not reconcile in the filed values.
  • Review — Transparency & Controls: Foreign grant itemization did not reconcile in the filed values.