Global inequalities in ownership-based carbon footprints over 2010-2022

Who owns the firms that produce global greenhouse gas emissions? We provide the first global estimates of ownership-based greenhouse gas emissions across and within 197 jurisdictions from 2010-2022. We link production-based emissions to owners using data on wealth distributions, portfolio compositions by wealth level, public capital stocks, and foreign investment positions, among other sources. We find that a large share of ownership-based emissions is tied to a small number of asset owners. Because top wealth groups hold portfolios that are, on average, more carbon-intensive, inequality in ownership-based emissions exceeds inequality in wealth. Our results suggest that net foreign ownership emissions could play a growing role in shaping emission responsibility between countries and regions. For example, Western Europe stands out as a region where production-based emissions decline over the 2010-2022 period, but foreign ownership-based emissions do not. Although recent policies have begun to reflect concerns raised by consumption-based accounting (such as quotas on the carbon content of imports) the emissions associated with ownership of foreign production remain largely unaccounted for.