TRADE GAINS: THE END OF THE ROAD?

Murray Kemp

The Singapore Economic Review (SER), 2005, vol. 50, issue spec0, 361-368

Abstract: In 1972, the potential gainfulness of free trade was established under fairly general assumptions — essentially those of Arrow and Debreu. Since then, the assumptions have been considerably weakened, notably by accommodating overlapping mortal generations and an infinite horizon. However, there remain several indispensable but implausible assumptions. Two of those assumptions are examined, in a preliminary way, in the present paper: (a) in finite trade models of Arrow–Debreu type, each individual is sufficiently ill-informed or irrational to believe that he/she has no market power; (b) in models of overlapping generations and infinite horizons, there are no intergenerational bequests or giftsinter vivos. Few clear generalizations are found. However, an attempt is made to describe circumstances under which assumptions (a) and (b) can be abandoned.

Keywords: Gains from trade; overlapping generations; hidden Arrow–Debreu assumptions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0217590805002086
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wsi:serxxx:v:50:y:2005:i:spec0:n:s0217590805002086

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from

DOI: 10.1142/S0217590805002086

Access Statistics for this article

The Singapore Economic Review (SER) is currently edited by Euston Quah

More articles in The Singapore Economic Review (SER) from World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Tai Tone Lim ().