Middlemen and the Allocation of Heterogeneous Goods*
构建了一个一般均衡模型，解释中间商如何在消费者偏好和商品都高度异质的环境中促进交易，并从生产速率、匹配时间偏好损失和匹配质量三个维度衡量交易收益。
This article presents a general equilibrium model in which middlemen emerge to facilitate trade in an environment of idiosyncratic tastes and heterogeneous goods. The gains to the traders can be measured along three dimensions: the rate of production, the time-preference losses generated by the matching process, and the quality of the match between consumers' preferences and the goods they ultimately consume. Copyright Economics Department of the University of Pennsylvania and the Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association