They argued that most people's passions tend to be in areas like sports and arts, which offer limited career opportunities, recommending instead to focus on developing skills in meaningful work, as passion typically develops as a result of mastery and purpose rather than being a prerequisite.

[10][11] Accordingly, the organisation spends significant resources considering interventions perceived to have persisting effects over time, such as improving AI safety or governance, preventing nuclear warfare or pandemics, or enhancing decision-making.

[12][13] The largest funder of 80,000 Hours has been Open Philanthropy backed by husband and wife Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna with $10m of cumulative donations up to 2019.

[14] Other significant individual donors include Ben Delo, Luke Ding, Sam Bankman-Fried, Alex Gordon-Brown, Denise Melchin and Jaan Tallinn.

Organisational funders have included the Frederick Mulder Foundation and the Effective Altruism Meta Fund.