Why do people coordinate on the use of valueless pieces of paper as generally accepted money? A possible answer is that these objects have intrinsic properties that make them better candidates to be used as media of exchange. Another answer stresses the fact that unconvertible fiat money will...

This paper provides a search theoretical model that captures two phenomena that have characterized several episodes of monetary history: currency shortages and the circulation of privately issued notes. As usual in these models, the media of exchange are determined as part of the equilibrium. We...

There are two general ways in which the role of fiat money has been introduced in the standard monetary search-theoretical model. The first is to bring in the model a fiat object with different intrinsic properties. The second is to introduce a centralized institution that favors the use of fiat...