factual

Supply-Demand Convergence With Few Participants

Contrary to the belief that competitive convergence requires complete information and a large 'sea' of buyers and sellers, experimental supply-and-demand markets converge to competitive equilibrium easily even with very small numbers of participants.

factualpending

Speaker

Vernon Smith

Evidence Quote

here I was doing experiments with 15, 20, 25 people; and we were getting convergence easily. And then I did them with smaller numbers, and those supply-and-demand markets worked really well. So that was a surprise.

Source

Vernon Smith on Adam Smith and the Human EnterpriseEconTalk
Created: 6/13/2026, 12:22:45 AM

My Notes

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