Thomas Malthus and others!

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Thomas Malthus and others!
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Microsoft Encarta 97
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• English economist - 1766 to 1834
• Witnessed huge population increases in European
  cities (England) due to Industrial Revolution.
• Wrote An Essay on the Principle of Population
  (1798) in which he argued that populations grow
  geometrically (exponentially) 1,2,4,8,16,32
  but food supply only arithmetically -
  1,2,3,4,5,6,.
• Population would soon outstrip food supply.

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Stage Food supply Population A
1 1 B 2 2 C 3 4 D
4 8 E 5 16 etc.
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• Population and Food are in sync in stages A, B
  and even C.
• But in stage D and E you begin to have a large
  gap. People start to suffer and die of famine.
  Riots and war could break out, more people die.
  Diseases and plagues kill even more.
• The population is reduced back to stage C or
  even B.
• The above killers are called population checks.

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• Population checked - at least for awhile.
• Sometimes called Malthusian checks.
• Argued that moral restraint was only hope no
  premarital sex, later marriages.
• Very Victorian, very religious.

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• However, didnt happen as he forecast.
• Birth rates declined soon after death rates did.
  Contraception became more widespread.
• Industrialization and urbanization meant less
  need for family labour.
• Child labour laws and mandatory schooling laws
  meant children had to be supported far longer.
  Therefore family sizes decreased.

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• Better health (public and personal hygiene and
  better food) meant lower death rates.
• More children survived people lived longer.
• Children became economic liabilities instead of
  assets.
• Family size shrank.
• Never reached stage D or E, BUT

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• In a developing world the population did not
  reduce itself, it remained high.
• Population checks did take effect and killed
  many people.
• But along came Emergency Aid, the Red Cross,
  CARE and the UN, etc.
• People that were, according to Malthus, slated
  to die survived into stages D and E. That is
  why we have areas of the world with massive
  famine.
• With aid Are we saving lives or prolonging
  deaths?

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• Karl Marx
• (1818-1883)
• German political philosopher and revolutionist,
  cofounder of scientific socialism (modern
  communism)
• as such, one of the most influential thinkers of
  all times
• major critic of Malthus

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• Marx objected to Malthus because he saw his
  arguments to control population as merely
  maintaining the status quo, in other words
  protecting the already rich.
• It was a bourgeois (rich) point of view that
  would result in the same social inequalities.
• Malthus saw population growth as the fundamental
  cause of poverty Marx saw the capitalist system
  as the primary cause.

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• It wasnt so much a matter of the numbers of
  people but the inequitable distribution of wealth
  created by the capitalist economic system.
• Marx also saw surplus population differently.
  Malthus saw it as a result of population growth.
• One argument used when people see starving
  children on TV is Its their problem, why dont
  they just have less kids.

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• Marx saw it as a consequence of the capitalist
  system that relies upon a pool of unemployed or a
  reserve of a cheap labour force.
• An argument for the above point is In order to
  have rich we need the poor. Someone has to work
  for cheap. In the one hour that I work in a
  factory, I make 10 while the boss makes 1000
  off of my one hour work. We have enough food and
  resources we just have to spread them out more
  evenly! How much does a star athelete make?

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• A great cartoon (it was too difficult to
  reproduce here text was taken from the
  Internationalist magazine, Sept. 1979) shows us
  the difference between Malthus and Marx clearly
• A wealthy man in a suit approaches a farmer
  working in his field.
• The rich man says to the poor farmer I dont
  wish to interfere but do you realize that world
  population is going to increase by nearly 50 in
  20 years? What are you going to do about it?

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• The poor farmer responds Whats wrong with
  people? I like people.
• To which the rich man answers Well so do I,
  of course. But you see the worlds resources
  cant stand an ever-increasing population.
• So the farmer responds I see. So its a
  problem of resources as well as people.
• The rich man proudly answers Yes.

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• The farmer then says So the answer is resource
  control as well as birth control.
• The rich man hesitates with a Yyes.
• Finally the poor farmer concludes Well then, I
  dont want to interfere but do you realize that
  the rich 10 of the world consume 90 of the
  resources? What are you going to do about that?

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This is a very powerful statement and if you
think about it maybe thats why there is war and
unrest and terrorism throughout the world!

• Paul Ehrlich
• In 1968 he published a book The Population Time
  Bomb
• He believed rapid population growth would cause
  mass famine and economic catastrophe

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• In his book, he predicted millions of people
  would starve to death during the 1970s and 1980s.
• This did not occur because food production
  increased faster than population growth during
  these times.
• Currently he is focusing on the impacts of
  overpopulation , over consumption and damaging
  technologies may have on the environment global
  warming, acid rain, ozone depletion, starvation,
  malnutrition, war, crime and disease.

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• Population size and environmental problems are
  not linked to developing nations only
• The U.S. is a good example population problems
  occur in rich countries as well the blackout,
  pollution, crime etc.
• Ehrlich does not believe that science will save
  us. Science has helped in increasing food
  production, but it has not improved the
  distribution of food and science has destroyed
  the soil through fertilization and pesticide use.

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• Humans are subject to the earths carrying
  capacity the maximum number of individuals that
  a habitat can support.
• The optimum global population will be determined
  by levels of energy consumption especially
  fossil fuels. Wow, this is an amazing prediction
  based on the blackout of 2003!
• Rich countries consume 70 of all energy. If the
  worlds population grows to 10 billion, the
  energy consumption in the developed world will
  jump to 90.

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• He believes that the earth is already 2 billion
  people over based on the current energy
  consumption levels.
• Even if populations are reduced through
  education, health care and birth control, it
  would be difficult to convince the developed
  world to decrease their affluence. (again what
  happened during the blackout of 2003)
• Ehrlich believes there are too many people
  consuming too much!

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• Julian Simon
• Mr. Simon believes that the neo-Malthusians are
  all wrong. They are wrong about, food, energy,
  resources and the environment.
• Life expectancy has increased, food production
  has increased, we have discovered more resources.
  Simon says that things are not resources until we
  (humans) figure out how to use them. He believes
  we have an infinite amount of resources, once we
  learn how to use them.

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• Humans will find ways to conserve resources or
  we will develop substitutes. Technology will help
  us. This is called a Cornucopian point of view.
• There is still room for improvement. We can
  clear more land for farming. We can irrigate more
  desert. We can drain more wetlands.
• Simon sees the human race as an asset not a
  liability.

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Simon agrees with Esther Boserup she states
that agricultural methods dictates the size of
the population. More people grow more food
for a more indepth look at Boserup click
here. Who is right Boserup (Simon) or Ehrlich or
Malthus? A Debate!
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The End!