Dominic Adam
James Grant
Jon Heston
Connie Hsu
Brandon Nguyen
Alice San
Barter and Trade
Barter is better defined by what it does rather than what it is; it allows agents to create value. Not necessarily value from fiat, but value from negotiation, bargaining, comparison, turmoil, haggle, and stress; all forms of labor and personal interaction. However, barter has one requirement—a double coincidence of wants (Hayashi, 1994). And from this stance we can presume that the earliest encounters with trade and bartering occurred when people first created items and wanted other items. What better place to start an exploration of barter than with the ancients of 500 B.C. Click here to read the complete paper, including a barter experiment on Ring Road that turned a pile of junk into $248 worth of goods and services.
1 comment:
I was blown away by this project: the students took a bunch of junk in their dorm rooms and, in an afternoon, converted it into over $200 in goods and services, simply by setting up a table on campus and inviting people to barter with them. My favorite part of this paper, though, is the very first sentence: barter is defined by what it does, not by what it is. This is a provocative point, one that can be applied to value, money, and a host of other concepts we encountered in this class.
I also very much appreciated the sections on the intersection of information technologies and bartering: from Craigslist to Napster and beyond. The paper helps us to think about bartering, sharing, and gifting, while nicely bringing it all home in the discussion of the experiment on Ring Road. A fantastic project, and one I am sure the students will remember for a long time!
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