Equilibria under Knightian Price Uncertainty

We study economies in which agents face Knightian uncertainty about state prices. Knightian uncertainty leads naturally to nonlinear expectations. We introduce a corresponding equilibrium concept with sublinear prices and prove that equilibria exist under weak conditions. In general, such equilibria lead to Pareto inefficient allocations; the equilibria coincide with Arrow-Debreu equilibria only if the values of net trades are ambiguity-free in the mean. In economies without aggregate uncertainty, inefficiencies are generic. We introduce a constrained efficiency concept, uncertainty-neutral efficiency; equilibrium allocations under price uncertainty are efficient in this constrained sense. Arrow-Debreu equilibria turn out to be non-robust with respect to the introduction of Knightian uncertainty.