Kinetic wealth distribution models and diffusive limit equations

01.01.2010 - 31.12.2011
Forschungsförderungsprojekt
An important aim of mathematical models for economics is to understand allocation and misallocation of capital, income and wealth. Real economies are governed by aggregate behavior of a large number of individual agents. To understand the interplay between micro- and macro-behavior hence is at the heart of any mathematical-economical model that will allow to understand market anomalies and financial crises. Kinetic models for wealth and income distributions successfully use methods from statistical mechanics to model the behavior of a large number of interacting individuals or agents in an economy. These models lead to generalizations of the classical Boltzmann equation for gas dynamics. A variety of models has been proposed and studied in view of the relation between parameters in the microscopic rules and the resulting macroscopic statistics. Various extensions of these models have been proposed and are still under investigation, e.g., time-dependent saving propensities and mechanisms for taxation, and bimodal wealth distribution curves have been observed when different, homogeneous groups of agents interact. Less effort has been devoted so far to models with an additional independent stratification variable (in analogy with position in classical kinetic theory) which leads to inhomogeneous Boltzmann equations and their limit equations. This is the starting point for this project. The main goals of this project are the development of new models that extend the currently simplistic approaches to stratified, inhomogeneous Boltzmann equations. Our aim is to explain from microscopic interactions the emergence of prevalent patterns and anomalies in real economic data like multiple modes in the wealth distribution curves and to model the effects of education, gender and social status on individuals' income and wealth.

Personen

Projektleiter_in

Institut

Grant funds

  • OeAD-GmbH - Agentur für Bildung und Internationalisierung (National) Austrian Exchange Service (OeAD)

Forschungsschwerpunkte

  • Beyond TUW-research focus: 70%
  • Modeling and Simulation: 30%

Schlagwörter

DeutschEnglisch
Vermögensverteilungwealth distribution
LangzeitverhaltenLong-time asymptotics
Entropie-dissipierende numerische SchemataEntropy dissipating numerical schemes

Publikationen