I am writing to let you know about the Columbia-Cornell Symposium on Inequality, Entropy, and Econophysics that I am co-organizing. It is to be held on May, 30-31, 2019, at the Riverside Church Conference Hall near Columbia University. Details about it can be found here: http://iee-symposium.org/?page=home

While the topic is not mainstream process systems engineering, it might interest you to know that the systems engineering perspective - in combination with fundamental principles from political philosophy, economics, statistical mechanics, game theory, and information theory - offers interesting insights into the properties and behavior of a dynamical system comprising of millions of rational agents, i.e., a free-market capitalist society. This novel framework addresses a 200-year-old open question in economics, namely, "How much income inequality is fair?".

Income and wealth inequality has been identified has the defining challenge of our time. The World Economic Forum in Davos has recognized this as a top global challenge on par with climate change. If you are curious about what systems engineering can offer to address this challenge, please do join us. Since the seating capacity is limited, please write to me if you are interested in attending.

Best,

Venkat