Money Is Memory

Money is more than memory∗

Impersonal exchange is the hallmark of an advanced society and money is one key institution that supports it. Economic theory regards money as a crude arrangement for monitoring counterparts’ past conduct. If so, then a public record of past actions—or memory—should supersede the function performed by money. This intriguing theoretical postulate remains untested. In an experiment, we show that ...

Money and Memory∗

This paper investigates the relationship between memory and the essentiality of fiat money. We consider a random matching economy with a large finite population in which commitment is not possible and memory is limited in the sense that only a fraction m ∈ (0, 1) of the population has publicly observable histories. We show that no matter how limited memory is, there exists a social norm that ac...

“ Money ” is the Reserves not the Money ∗

In this paper I will argue that the institutional implementations that we commonly include in our monetary aggregates are actually more similar to the concept of monetary base. I will also argue that the institutional implementation of accounts payable operates as money. This slightly translated definition implies that a new monetary aggregate that includes accounts payable may be useful for co...

Money Is Privacy

An extensive literature in monetary theory has emphasized the role of money as a recordkeeping device. Money assumes this role in situations where using credit would be too costly, and some might argue that this role will diminish as the cost of information, and thus the cost of credit-based transactions, continues to fall. In this paper we investigate another use for money: the provision of pr...

What is Money?