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Is it rational to have rational expectations?

Author

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  • Alan Kirman

    (GREQAM - Groupement de Recherche en Économie Quantitative d'Aix-Marseille - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - AMU - Aix Marseille Université - ECM - École Centrale de Marseille - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)

Abstract

In economics in situations where there is uncertainty one has to attribute some attitude to handling this uncertainty to individuals. The original idea was to assume that "people do not make systematic mistakes" for which Muth coined the term "rational expectations". This was replaced by a much more formal vision which suggested that people fully understand how the economy evolves. In this paper I will argue that the foundations of the "rational expectations" hypothesis which has underpinned most recent modern macroeconomic models, which have, in turn, been used for policymaking, are unsound. From a philosophical point of view the idea that agents can not only forecast the evolution of their environment but also their own evolution seems unjustified. If agents do manage to coordinate on specific expectations these may not be rational and can be self fulfilling. From an econometric point of view, when there are changes in the evolution of the economy, it is not rational to satisfy the hypothesis. Furthermore the empirical and experimental evidence suggests that we should abandon this route. Copyright Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2014

Suggested Citation

  • Alan Kirman, 2014. "Is it rational to have rational expectations?," Post-Print hal-01463917, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01463917
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    Cited by:

    1. Annarita COLASANTE & Antonio PALESTRINI & Alberto RUSSO & Mauro GALLEGATI, 2015. "Adaptive Expectations with Correction Bias: Evidence from the lab," Working Papers 409, Universita' Politecnica delle Marche (I), Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali.
    2. Giovanni Dosi & Mauro Napoletano & Andrea Roventini & Joseph E. Stiglitz & Tania Treibich, 2020. "Rational Heuristics? Expectations And Behaviors In Evolving Economies With Heterogeneous Interacting Agents," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 58(3), pages 1487-1516, July.
    3. Colasante, Annarita & Palestrini, Antonio & Russo, Alberto & Gallegati, Mauro, 2017. "Adaptive expectations versus rational expectations: Evidence from the lab," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 988-1006.
    4. Ron Wallace, 2017. "The Signature of Risk: Agent-based Models, Boolean Networks and Economic Vulnerability," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 6(1), pages 1-15, March.
    5. Ya-Chi Huang & Chueh-Yung Tsao, 2018. "Evolutionary Frequency and Forecasting Accuracy: Simulations Based on an Agent-Based Artificial Stock Market," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 52(1), pages 79-104, June.
    6. Giovanni Dosi & Andrea Roventini, 2019. "La solitudine dell'agente rappresentativo: eterogeneità e interazione per una nuova macroeconomia (The solitude of the representative agant: Heterogeneity and interaction for a new macroeconomics)," Moneta e Credito, Economia civile, vol. 72(287), pages 249-258.
    7. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/31dhti786q9k0q2i04klh6no54 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Giovanni Dosi & Andrea Roventini, 2019. "More is different ... and complex! the case for agent-based macroeconomics," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 29(1), pages 1-37, March.
    9. Eric Kemp-Benedict, 2020. "Macroeconomic impacts of the public health response to COVID-19," Working Papers PKWP2011, Post Keynesian Economics Society (PKES).
    10. Marcello Nieddu & Marco Raberto & Andrea Teglio, 2025. "The importance of being many: dynamics, interaction and aggregation in a multi-sector economy," Working Papers 2025: 04, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    11. Cooray, Arusha & Gangopadhyay, Partha & Das, Narasingha, 2023. "Causality between volatility and the weekly economic index during COVID-19: The predictive power of efficient markets and rational expectations," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    12. Adalbert Mayer, 2022. "An Agent-Based Macroeconomic Model with Endogenous Intertemporal Decision Rules," Eastern Economic Journal, Palgrave Macmillan;Eastern Economic Association, vol. 48(4), pages 548-579, October.
    13. Giovanni Dosi & Andrea Roventini, 2024. "Evolutionary Growth Theory," LEM Papers Series 2024/02, Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy.

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