Econophysics of Income and Wealth Distributions

The distribution of wealth and income is never uniform, and philosophers and economists have tried for years to understand the reasons and formulate remedies for such inequalities. This book introduces the elegant and intriguing kinetic exchange models that physicists have developed to tackle these issues. This is the first monograph in econophysics focussed on the analyses and modelling of these distributions, and is ideal for physicists and economists. It is written in simple, lucid language, with plenty of illustrations and in-depth analyses, making it suitable for researchers new to this field as well as specialized readers. It explores the origin of economic inequality and examines the scientific steps that can be taken to reduce this inequality in the future.

1. Introduction; 2. Income and wealth distribution data for different countries; 3. Major socio-economic modellings; 4. Market exchanges and scattering process; 5. Analytic structure of the kinetic exchange market models; 6. Microeconomic foundation of the kinetic exchange models; 7. Dynamics: generation of income, inequality and development; 8. Outlook; References; Index.

Bikas K. Chakrabarti is a Senior Professor of Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics at the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics and a visiting Professor of Economics at the Indian Statistical Institute. He has research interests in statistical physics, condensed matter physics, computational physics and econophysics.
Anirban Chakraborti is an Associate Professor at the Quantitative Finance Group, École Centrale Paris. He has research interests in statistical physics, econophysics and quantum physics.
Satya R. Chakravarty is a Professor in the Economic Research Unit of the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata. His main areas of research interest are welfare economics, public economics, mathematical finance, industrial organization and game theory.
Arnab Chatterjee is a postdoctoral researcher at Aalto University, Finland. He has research interests in statistical physics and its application to condensed matter and social sciences.