The physics basis

This article unifies physics with economics by showing that the distribution of wealth is related proportionally to the movement of all the streams of a live society. The ‘unequal’ distribution of wealth on the earth happens naturally. Hierarchy is unavoidable, with staying power, and difficult to efface.

Two architectures illustrate this idea: river basins and the movement of freight.

The nonuniform distribution of wealth becomes more accentuated as the economy becomes more developed, i.e., as its flow architecture becomes more complex for the purpose of covering smaller and smaller interstices of the overall (fixed) territory.

This theory also predicts the Lorenz-type distribution of income inequality, which was adopted empirically for a century.

Reference

• A. Bejan and M. R. Errera, Wealth inequality: The physics basis, Journal of Applied Physics, 121, 28 March 2017.