ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Wassily Leontief

Okay kiddo, let me tell you about Wassily Leontief. He was a very smart man who studied how businesses and people make things and trade them with each other.

You know how some people work at farms to grow food, and then other people buy that food at the store? Well, Leontief looked at how much stuff each type of worker needed to do their job, like how much water, electricity, and other things they used. Then he looked at how much stuff they made and sold.

But he didn't just look at one job or one farm, he looked at a whole country, like the United States! He wanted to know how much stuff every type of worker in the whole country needed and made.

He found out some really interesting things! One thing he found was that some jobs needed a lot of stuff to make the things they sell, but other jobs didn't need as much stuff. And some jobs made a lot of things, but other jobs didn't make as much.

This helped people understand that different jobs do different things and use different resources. It also helped people see how countries trade with each other, because some countries are better at making some things than others.

So, that's what Wassily Leontief did. He looked at how much stuff people need and make, and helped people understand how countries trade with each other. Pretty interesting stuff, huh?