Temporal evolution of the "thermal" and "superthermal" income classes in the USA during 1983-2001

Personal income distribution in the USA has a well-defined two-class structure. The majority of population (97–99%) belongs to the lower class characterized by the exponential Boltzmann-Gibbs ("thermal") distribution, whereas the upper class (1–3% of the population) has a Pareto power law ("superthermal") distribution. By analyzing income data for 1983–2001, we show that the "thermal" part is stationary in time, save for a gradual increase of the effective temperature, whereas the "superthermal" tail swells and shrinks following the stock market. We discuss the concept of equilibrium inequality in a society, based on the principle of maximal entropy, and quantitatively show that it applies to the majority of population.

• Publication year

  2004

• Venue

  EPL

• Publication date

  2004-06-16

• Fields of study

  Mathematics, Physics, Economics

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1209/epl/i2004-10330-3arXiv cond-mat/0406385
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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