An analysis of the asymmetric-information translation service market in China

Abstract

Globalization has enhanced the demand for information-exchange, which has also encouraged the development of translation service industry. Currently, the studies of translation service industry and its market have based on the information symmetry hypothesis. The quality of translation service is only known to the provider, which belongs to an asymmetric information situation; therefore, the translation service market may become lemon market if the providers take advantage of the information asymmetric. This paper uses the lemon market theory by Akerlof to find the reasons and solutions for the lemon market of translation service in China.