This laboratory experiment explores the extent to which impersonal exchange emerges from personal exchange with opportunities for long-distance trade. We design a three-commodity production and exchange economy in which agents in three geographically separated villages must develop multilateral...

We design an experiment to explore how geography shapes exchange between spatially distant markets and hypothesize that geographical isolation of traveling intermediaries from stationary sources of production creates social isolation that hinders trade. We characterize our economies with a...