Andrea Bacilieri @abacilieri.bsky.social · 05/05/2026Bottom line: Understand measurement before studying production networks, as it shapes what is observed. Differences across datasets often reflect reporting rules, not real structure. 🎯 Benchmark for: • Working with firm-level networks • Calibrating macro models • Creating synthetic data 010 0
Andrea Bacilieri @abacilieri.bsky.social · 05/05/2026Distribution of firm-to-firm transaction values spans more than 10 orders of magnitude, even in mid-sized countries. Sales, expenses, & the num of customers & suppliers are all positively correlated. We report precise and non-obvious elasticities. Many large firms actually have very few partners. 100 0
Andrea Bacilieri @abacilieri.bsky.social · 05/05/2026Some robust features we find: Distributions of the num of customers & suppliers: heavy-tailed, but very different exponents. Largest firms have a huge num of customers, but far fewer suppliers. Excess clustering & reciprocity: firms form dense clusters in which they trade with each other. .... 100 0
Andrea Bacilieri @abacilieri.bsky.social · 05/05/2026By contrast, the tail exponent of the distribution of transaction values is not affected by the reporting threshold. 100 0
Andrea Bacilieri @abacilieri.bsky.social · 05/05/2026For example, the average number of trading partners can vary by an order of magnitude across datasets – largely driven by reporting thresholds rather than real economic differences. 100 0