Voluntary exchange is the act of buyers and sellers freely and willingly engaging in market transactions. Moreover, transactions are made in such a way that both the buyer and the seller are better off after the exchange than before it occurred.
Many economists believe that voluntary exchanges are more conducive to economic efficiency than exchanges mandated by governments.
Famous quotes containing the words voluntary and/or exchange:
“Her voluntary fruits, free without fees;”
—Torquato Tasso (1544–1595)
“To coöperate in the highest as well as the lowest sense, means to get our living together. I heard it proposed lately that two young men should travel together over the world, the one without money, earning his means as he went, before the mast and behind the plow, the other carrying a bill of exchange in his pocket. It was easy to see that they could not long be companions or coöperate, since one would not operate at all. They would part at the first interesting crisis in their adventures.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)