标题： 重新审视收入的热力学和超热力学两类分布：一种批判性观点 显示英文标题

标题： Revisiting the thermal and superthermal two-class distribution of incomes: A critical perspective

摘要： 本文对过去十年物理学家进行的收入分配实证研究提出了两个方面的批评。 他们的发现基于对归一化收入观测分布的图形分析。 两个中心观察结果导致了大多数收入呈指数分布的结论，但每项单独的证据或它们的同时观察并不能强有力地证明热和超热混合分布比合理的其他替代方案更符合观测到的收入分布。 使用流行的拟合度量进行的正式分析表明，虽然具有幂律尾部的指数分布比对数正态分布（经济学家通常假设的）更能拟合美国国税局的收入数据，但通过添加一个对数正态成分，热和超热混合分布的拟合可以进一步改善。 本文探讨了收入的热和超热分布以及扩展混合分布的经济影响。 显示英文摘要

摘要： This paper offers a two-pronged critique of the empirical investigation of the income distribution performed by physicists over the past decade. Their finding rely on the graphical analysis of the observed distribution of normalized incomes. Two central observations lead to the conclusion that the majority of incomes are exponentially distributed, but neither each individual piece of evidence nor their concurrent observation robustly proves that the thermal and superthermal mixture fits the observed distribution of incomes better than reasonable alternatives. A formal analysis using popular measures of fit shows that while an exponential distribution with a power-law tail provides a better fit of the IRS income data than the log-normal distribution (often assumed by economists), the thermal and superthermal mixture's fit can be improved upon further by adding a log-normal component. The economic implications of the thermal and superthermal distribution of incomes, and the expanded mixture are explored in the paper.