AN OBJECT-ORIENTED KNOWLEDGE-BASED APPROACH FOR FORMULATING APPLIED GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM-MODELS

This paper proposes and illustrates an object-oriented, knowledge-base d approach to formulate Applied General Equilibrium (AGE) models. In t his framework, an AGE model is viewed as a collection of structured ob jects from the real world such as economic agents and prices. A frame representation of major objects in AGE models for world trade is prese nted. This representation can be used as the structure of a model base in a loosely coupled intelligent modeling system. In such a system, c onstructing an AGE model appears to be an intuitive rather than an abs tract process. This intuitive process needs more understanding of subs tance of economics and the logic underlying the problem at hand rather than mathematical notation.