MONEY, COMPETITIVE EFFICIENCY, AND INTERGENERATIONAL TRANSACTIONS

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: WANG, P
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF MONETARY ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0304-3932
• DOI: 10.1016/0304-3932(93)90007-3
• 发表日期: 1993
• 页码: 303-320
• 关键词: Overlapping generations; money; EFFICIENCY; BILATERAL BALANCE

摘要

This paper shows that a three-period overlapping-generations model with an inverse-V life-cycle endowment structure can generally restore the first welfare theorem without imposing price characterization conditions. Even when Walras's law fails, a Walrasian equilibrium may be optimal in a three-period model, depending on the endowment and generational structure. If middle-aged generations have sufficiently high income so that both the old and the young are net borrowers, transactions are generation-by-generation bilaterally balanced, thus ruling out potentially better but unenforceable contracts in equilibrium and ensuring competitive efficiency. When there are imbalances, fiat money, which serves as a medium of intergenerational exchanges, becomes valuable.