We analyze a general equilibrium model with search frictions and differentiated commodities. Because of the many differentiated commodities, barter is difficult because it requires a double coincidence of wants, and this provides a medium of exchange role for fiat money. We prove the existence...

We extend the analysis of Kiyotaki and Wright, who study an economy in which the different commodities that serve as media of exchange are determined endogenously. Kiyotaki and Wright consider only symmetric, steady-state, pure-strategy equilibria, and find that for some parameter values no such...

We develop a model of gross job and worker flows and use it to study how the wages, permanent incomes, and employment status of individual workers evolve over time. Our model helps explain various features of labor markets, such as the amount of worker turnover in excess of job reallocation, the...

This article reexamines the conventional wisdom that commercial banking is in severe decline. A careful reading of the evidence does not support it. True, on-balance sheet assets held by commercial banks have declined as a share of total intermediary assets. But this measure ignores the...

This article argues that the poor performance of the U.S. banking industry in the 1980s was due mainly to the risk-taking of the largest banks, which was encouraged by the U.S. government's too-big-to-fail policy. The article documents the recent trend toward riskier bank portfolios and the...