Among the conventions of almost every human society of historical record has been the use of money, i.e., particular commodities or tokens as measures of value and media of exchange in economic transactions. Somehow the members of a society agree on what will be acceptable tender in making...

The Invisible Hand, one of the Great Ideas of history and one of the most influential, is Adam Smith's most important legacy to macroeconomics, as to all economics. It is particularly important today as the ultimate inspiration for the New Classical Macroeconomics and for Real Business Cycle...

Portfolio theory has been an important component of open economy macroeconomic models. In those models, it is essential to distinguish among several categories of assets, both foreign and domestic, and to specify the demands and supplies. This framework has become increasingly relevant....

Jan Tinbergen was and is of course a scientist, full of curiosity about how the world works. But his motivation has always been more than curiosity. He wants to know how the world works so that he can make it work better. Knowledge is the foundation of policy. It was natural for Tinbergen to set...

This is an essay on Financial Intermediaries written for the New Palgrave. It includes sections on national wealth, financial markets, assets, risk and regulation.