Methodology

Boston in 2024

Tipping Fee: The cost per ton that municipalities pay to dispose of trash at incineration or landfill facilities. Boston's tipping fee is $103.38 per ton.
Municipal Solid Waste: Trash collected through Boston's municipal waste management program.
Household: A residential unit participating in Boston's municipal trash program. 322,000 households participated in 2024.
Tonnage: The total weight of trash disposed by participating households, measured in tons. Boston disposed of 186,305 tons in 2024, which converts to 372,610,000 pounds.

Total pounds of trash: T × 2,000 lbs/ton = 186,305 × 2,000 = 372,610,000 pounds
Tons per household: T ÷ H = 186,305 ÷ 322,000 = 0.579 tons per household
Total incineration cost: T × F = 186,305 × $103.38 = $19,260,210.90

Average Reduction: How much trash 5 cities reduced per household after 5 years with PAYT = 0.260 tons per household.
Percent Reduction: How much less trash households threw away = 44.95%.
Projected Reduction: How much trash Boston could reduce if it does as well as other cities = 83,629.87 tons over 5 years.

Per-Household Revenue: How much money each household generates through PAYT bag and tag sales in Malden.
Revenue Source: The different ways cities earn money from PAYT, like bag sales or trash tag sales.
Scaling: Using Malden's revenue earned per household to estimate how much Boston could earn.
Illustrative: This is an example calculation, not a prediction of what will actually happen.

Step 1 - Malden's revenue per household: Divide Malden's total money by households.
Step 2 - Scale to Boston: Multiply Malden's per-household amount by 272,500.
Bag revenue example: $47.11 × 272,500 = $12,837,475
Tag revenue example: $31.26 × 272,500 = $8,518,760
Important note: This assumes Boston would work like Malden, which may not be true.

Step 1: Merge data sources to obtain key information

Data sources include the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection's Municipal Solid Waste and Recycling surveys from 2009 to 2024, inclusive; the Massachusetts Department of Revenue's Division of Local Services; and the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection's spreadsheet, "Massachusetts Municipalities with PAYT Programs, June 2025".
Key information: PAYT adoption year, years pre- and post-PAYT adoption, number of households enrolled in each municipality's trash system, annual tonnage disposed per household.

Step 2: Generate annual tons of waste disposed per household

Tons per household are calculated by dividing the municipality's total annual disposal tonnage by the number of households served by the PAYT program.
Tons per household standardizes our metric, as larger municipalities will dispose of more total trash than smaller municipalities.

Step 3: Remove records that would distort the "normal trash" comparison

Step 4: Identify the longest pre- and post-period for parallel trends

Filter data to contain municipalities with data 5 years before implementing PAYT through 5 years after implementing PAYT.
If one town has 20 years of data and another has 3 years, comparisons may not follow parallel trends; therefore, we may not conclude that adopting PAYT had a statistically significant result.

Step 5: Select Harvard, Chicopee, Heath, Hinsdale, and Peru

Step 6: Create a time series chart

IMPORTANT NOTE: Our time of adoption begins at -1 (the adoption year); Year 0 is the implementation year; Year 1 is one year after implementation.