Approximate versus Exact Equilibria in Dynamic Economies

This paper develops theoretical foundations for an error analysis of approximate equilibria in dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models with heterogeneous agents and incomplete financial markets. While there are several algorithms that compute prices and allocations for which agents' first-order conditions are approximately satisfied ("approximate equilibria"), there are few results on how to interpret the errors in these candidate solutions and how to relate the computed allocations and prices to exact equilibrium allocations and prices. We give a simple example to illustrate that approximate equilibria might be very far from exact equilibria. We then interpret approximate equilibria as equilibria for close-by economies; that is, for economies with close-by individual endowments and preferences. Copyright The Econometric Society 2005.