Are rich people smarter?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Levy, M
• 署名单位: Hebrew University of Jerusalem
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC THEORY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0022-0531
• DOI: 10.1016/S0022-0531(03)00024-3
• 发表日期: 2003
• 页码: 42-64
• 关键词: pareto; wealth distribution; INEQUALITY; investment talent; market efficiency

摘要

We formulate a general stochastic process of wealth accumulation by capital investment and analyze the conditions required to ensure convergence to the empirically observed Pareto wealth distribution. While homogeneous investment talent leads to the Pareto distribution under very general conditions, even a mild degree of differential investment talent results in a non-Pareto wealth distribution. This finding suggests that chance, rather than differential investment talent, is the dominant factor in the process of wealth accumulation by financial investment. Our findings conform with market efficiency and may have implications regarding the origins, the economic significance, and the social desirability of wealth inequality at the high-wealth range. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science (USA). All rights reserved.