Individual Forecasting and Aggregate Outcomes: 'Rational Expectations' Examined

Description

Growing out of a conference on Expectations Formation and Economic Disequilibrium held in New York City in 1981, the papers in this volume provide a complex view of market processes in which individual rationality is no guarantee of convergence to the 'correct' model and the equilibrium coordination of agents' plans. They reject the 'optimality' argument for the rational expectations hypothesis, opening the door to other hypotheses of optimal expectations of agents in the decentralized market economy.

'I recommend the book to economists interested in rational expectations for their own reading and for required reading in the graduate courses they teach.' Journal of Economic Literature 'After reading this excellent, stimulating book the uncommitted reader may well feel that there are several logical or methodological problems which imply that the usual class of models which embodies the rational expectations hypothesis is unattractive as a basis for some form of economic analysis, in particular, macroeconomic policy design ... I suspect that the concept of model theoretic expectations will generate useful insights in the modelling of expectations in a number of areas such as asset markets or arbitrage process. It naturally leads to a consideration of expectations generated as some weighted average of different models. I greatly enjoyed this book and can strongly recommend it.' The Economic Journal