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ameliustoday at 3:39 PM3 repliesview on HN

Yeah if you look at the Boltzmann Wealth Model, where every actor gives away 1 dollar to a random person, and you repeat this, then if you start with an equal wealth distribution, you end up with an exponential wealth distribution. That shows how strong exponential curves are :) A few "lucky" individuals become very wealthy, while the vast majority of people end up with very little or nothing.

The effect is so strong that I'm starting to wonder if we should have laws against power laws, like we have in engineering when we try to make things stable.


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Balgairtoday at 4:32 PM

I mean, do we want the economy to be stable?

Not in a 'oh the rich don't so they control the media and so we don't' sorta way. But like in a 'lets educate people on the pluses and minuses, debate a while, and then come to an informed conclusion' sorta way.

Like, deep down, does the average person actually want a stable economy? Because it seems to me that there is an even split historically between the folks that want stability and a little patch of land and weekly rhythms, and the folks that just want to drunkenly burn couches in the street every full moon, or some such thing.

Not to be glib here at all. I like, would actually like to know the answer. Sorry if this comes off the cuff seeming.

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nonethewisertoday at 4:54 PM

>The effect is so strong that I'm starting to wonder if we should have laws against power laws

This is literally and unironically communism.

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bee_ridertoday at 4:38 PM

Sigmoid wealth tax maybe?

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