Monnaie, mémoire et spécialisation : une interprétation alternative

In search-theoretic models of monetary economies, equivalence between money and memory is referred to gift-giving economies. Kocherlakota and Iwai obtain on this basis interesting results. In this paper it is argued that such results should not be interpreted as their authors suggest it. As soon as specialisation is made endogenous, contrary to Kocherlakota?s model, it appears that money does not remedy an absence of double coïncidence of wants, a private information nor a lack of memory ; when specialisation is endogenous, money is nothing but the condition for a specialisation of production and for the decentralisation of a market economy. The idea of a record-keeping device is not sufficient by itself to define money. Classification JEL : E00, D83, E52