American Economic Review
ISSN 0002-8282 (Print) | ISSN 1944-7981 (Online)
The Evolution of Time Preference with Aggregate Uncertainty
American Economic Review
vol. 99,
no. 5, December 2009
(pp. 1925–53)
Abstract
We examine the evolutionary foundations of intertemporal preferences. When all the risk affecting survival and reproduction is idiosyncratic, evolution selects for agents who maximize the discounted sum of expected utility, discounting at the sum of the population growth rate and the mortality rate. Aggregate uncertainty concerning survival rates leads to discount rates that exceed the sum of population growth rate and death rate, and can push agents away from exponential discounting. (JEL D11, D81, D91)Citation
Robson, Arthur J., and Larry Samuelson. 2009. "The Evolution of Time Preference with Aggregate Uncertainty." American Economic Review, 99 (5): 1925–53. DOI: 10.1257/aer.99.5.1925Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- D11 Consumer Economics: Theory
- D81 Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
- D15 Intertemporal Consumer Choice; Life Cycle Models and Saving