On the Emergence of Exchange and Mediation in a Production Economy
Posted: 26 Jul 2001
Abstract
In this paper we simulate the behavior of a population of boundedly rational agents in a two good economy where all agents can spend their time budget for the production of one or both goods or trading. Agents update their strategies according to a simple imitation type learning rule with noise. It is shown that in several different setups both direct trade and trade via mediators who specialize in trading can emerge. Both increasing returns to scale in production and heterogeneity of production technologies facilitates the development of trade. For heterogeneous production technologies we can also observe the transition from a pure production economy via direct trade to an economy with mediated trade.
Keywords: Bounded rationality, Learning, Trade, Mediation
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation