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Econophysics of Wealth Distribution: A Comment

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Econophysics of Wealth Distributions

Part of the book series: New Economic Windows ((NEW))

Abstract

Some recent papers have proposed models of trading which produce realistic-looking distributions of wealth. This Comment argues that, while the models are correct arithmetically and the papers claim that the empirical support is persuasive, they involve undeclared simplifications that limit their application and that point to empirical propositions that are easily refuted. Since many of the simplifications involve dismissing the economists’ favorite price mechanism, it is important to realize why the models do not propose a coherent alternative. This Comment suggests several directions for future research on this important topic.

The author could not come to the workshop for unavoidable reasons, but sent this comment for discussion there and for inclusion in the Proc. Vol. — Editors.

Though these people do not necessarily agree with what is written, this paper has benefited from comments by Richard Arnott, Bill Baylis, Stefan Bornholdt, J.-P. Bouchaud, Bikas Chakrabarti, Eric Nodwell, Nicola Scafetta and Y. Sudhakar. Research assistance by Xuzhen Zhang is appreciated. An extended version of this Comment with more examples, more discussion and a longer bibliography can be found at http://www.uwindsor.ca/PaulAnglin.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, University of Windsor, Windsor, ON, Canada, N9B 3P4

    Paul M. Anglin

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  1. Paul M. Anglin
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics Division and Centre for Applied Mathematics and Computational Science, Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata, India

    Arnab Chatterjee , Sudhakar Yarlagadda  & Bikas K Chakrabarti ,  & 

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Anglin, P.M. (2005). Econophysics of Wealth Distribution: A Comment. In: Chatterjee, A., Yarlagadda, S., Chakrabarti, B.K. (eds) Econophysics of Wealth Distributions. New Economic Windows. Springer, Milano. https://doi.org/10.1007/88-470-0389-X_27

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