Abstract
This study defines the goods and services that constitute environmental protection activities in the United States. The US input—output (I–O) table serves as the basis for the definition of environmental protection activities developed in this study. The US environmental protection I–O tables identify the sectors that receive the revenues associated with purchases of goods and services to comply with environmental regulation as well as the sectors that demand environmental protection goods and services. The I–O framework also allows for the development of a measure of the importance of environmental protection activities relative to the US economy. Employment associated with environmental protection activities is also estimated.
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Notes
This study draws heavily on US Environmental Protection Agency (1995a).
For a detailed review of estimates of the size of the EP industry, see Parker et al. (1993).
The EBJ estimate includes revenue of private and publicly owned water utilities for water supply (conversation with Dan Noble on May 18, 1995). The EBJ value excludes revenue of POTWs (publicly owned treatment works).
When discussing current account EP activities, the distinction between `cost’ and `expenditures’ warrants clarification. The term expenditure usually refers to tangible out-of-pocket expenses while cost is a broader economic concept. For example, depreciation typically is not referred to as an expenditure because no transaction is associated with this expense. Depreciation is, however, a cost.
In addition, environmental fees, taxes, and penalties do not count as EP industry revenues.
For an in-depth description of the SEEA, see United Nations (1993a). Eurostat (1994) also contains information on incorporating environmental protection expenditures and physical emissions into a system of national accounts.
Additional details are provided in the report, The US Environmental Protection Industry: The Technical Document (US Environmental Protection Agency, 1995b).
US Environmental Protection Agency (1995a, Appendix A) contains a concordance between the sectors shown in Table 1 and the BEA input—output tables.
This table can be generated for 1977, 1982, 1985 and 1988. Due to the simplifying assumptions used in constructing the updated EP I—O tables (e.g. fixed expenditure patterns) it is dangerous to use the tables to make comparisons over time.
For caveats, see US Environmental Protection Agency (1995a, p. 18).
Criteria air pollutants consist of TSP, SOI, NOx, CO, VOCs and lead.
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© 1998 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
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Nestor, D.V., Pasurka, C.A. (1998). USA: Environmental protection activities and their consequences. In: Uno, K., Bartelmus, P. (eds) Environmental Accounting in Theory and Practice. Economy & Environment, vol 11. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-1433-4_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-1433-4_8
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