This paper incorporates the phenomenon of tolerance into an economic analysis, showing how different attitudes to trust and cooperation can affect economic outcomes. In the economic system we propose, tolerance is associated with the different weight that agents attribute to their own nature and to the institutional parameters in their utility function. We thus construct an overlapping generations model (OLG), showing that the incentives that influence descendants’ predisposition to tolerance depend on both institutional factors, where behaviour is imposed by rules, and on social (or cultural) factors, found in popular customs and established traditions. Our study highlights the absolute impossibility of affirming tolerance through formal rules. In fact, we show that intolerance emerges as persistent attitude (intolerance trap) and its control is only possible through constant and continuous interventions on the educational processes of new generations.

JEL Classification: D1, Z1 Theoretical and Practical Research in Economic Fields is indexed in IndexCopernicus, EBSCO, RePEC and in CEEOL database