Quick estimate: Global average is 4.8 tons per person = $50 additional per year per life saved = ~$1500 total (over 30 additional years of life), so over the course of saving an average person’s life the costs if you’re buying offsets are the same order as the costs of saving a life via a Givewell charity (~half).
For the people helped by Givewell recommended charities, the additional CO2 emissions are probably lower; among the world’s poorest, <1 tons of CO2 per capita per year is pretty common, which is <$300 over a lifetime, about an order of magnitude less than the cost of saving a life.
Quick estimate: Global average is 4.8 tons per person = $50 additional per year per life saved = ~$1500 total (over 30 additional years of life), so over the course of saving an average person’s life the costs if you’re buying offsets are the same order as the costs of saving a life via a Givewell charity (~half).
For the people helped by Givewell recommended charities, the additional CO2 emissions are probably lower; among the world’s poorest, <1 tons of CO2 per capita per year is pretty common, which is <$300 over a lifetime, about an order of magnitude less than the cost of saving a life.
It sounds like you’re assuming that averting the death of a child means there will be an additional person in expectation? Instead it looks more like parents have a target number of kids: https://davidroodman.com/blog/2014/04/16/the-mortality-fertility-link/
Thanks for the helpful reply!