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Re: on money

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>But, to me, the overwhelming merit of Menger is that he insists on
the spontaneous >emergence of money within the market and through
economic processes.

Just as a point of interest, this paper:

Ramon Marimon, Ellen McGrattan, Thomas Sargent. Money as a
medium of exchange in an economy with artificially intelligent agents.
Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, 14 (1990), 329-373.

is a constructive proof of the possibility of the emergence of a money
commodity via economic exchange. I once replicated this computational
experiment with a student. The main conclusion is that it is very easy
for the money commodity to be selected via a social convention that
emerges over time via local exchanges. All it requires is some very
basic learning and memory on the part of the agents.

I agree that Marx presents a causal story of the endogenous emergence of money.

-Ian.
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