Early Note
📌 Why this note?
This document, "Beyond Sector Averages: Disaggregated Input-Output Methods for Individual-Level Environmental Accounting", is an early working paper. It began as a personal "self-note"—my attempt to teach myself the intricacies of environmental input-output analysis by writing everything down.
As I dove into the topic, I found that while the high-level, sector-scale concepts are well-established in academia, the practical path to achieving true, transaction-scale accounting remained unclear. This note is the product of that exploration. It's part literature review, part synthesis of existing ideas in my own words, and part new proposal.
🔍 Key contributions
The note consolidates two key ideas that I believe are crucial for making micro-scale accounting a reality:
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Bidirectional Responsibility: We often focus on “product footprints” (linking environmental impact to consumption). This note formalizes the completely symmetric concept of “income footprints” (linking impact to the value-added activities like labor and capital that enable production). Both views are necessary for a complete and fair picture of an individual’s environmental responsibility.
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The Data Bridge: The biggest theoretical and practical hurdle has been the data. While the need for granularity is acknowledged, it was never clear (to my knowledge) how to systematically construct the massive, disaggregated Input-Output table required for the calculation. This note provides that missing link: a clear formulation for building a fine-scale economic model from two practical data sources—the Process Table (what an entity uses to make its products) and the Sales Table (who sells what to whom).
This paper is very much a work-in-progress, shared in the spirit of open collaboration. The current plan is to develop these ideas further and transform this single note into two more focused academic papers. You can follow their progress on the Publications page.
What do you think? I’d love to hear your feedback.