Seems interesting. I like this quote from one of the researchers in the physorg.com's article:
"As an agent gets richer, a feedback effect occurs by which the
rich are more likely to gain from a transaction than the poorer
agents -- thereby resulting in an accumulation of assets for the
richer players that is manifested as a power law tail."
The original paper [1] seems to define "thrift" as the ability of a richer player to exploit its advantage over a poorer one...
The physorg.com article's slant is interesting though, focussed on "experts", whatever that means:
"the scientists' findings might also provide guidance for experts
trying to distribute wealth more evenly."
I dunno; I've looked at the paper, and I think it's a cute metaphor. Don't know enough about the subjects to tell whether it goes further than that. Some remarks on econ sort of remind me of the simple models Hahnel uses in _ABCs of Political Economics_ to illustrate why inequality happens...
Tayssir --
[1] <http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0703201> "Economic Inequality: Is it Natural?"