Population Growth And Economic Development Essay

However, the relationship between population growth and economic development of a country could be considered as negative if the increase of population is become an obstacle to the country’s economic development. This is because the faster the population growth, the greater the dependency burden. In other words, the segment of population which is considered economically unproductive included children and the elderly, expands along with the population growth. According to Kelly and Schmidt (1996), this negative view could be proved by Thomas Malthus as he raised warning about the danger of over-population in his “Pessimism about the economic impacts of population” over two centuries ago and thus conquered the thinking of population analysts.

According to Meade (1961), he has analyzed the demographic situation in Mauritius. Consequently, Meade found that the country’s rapid population growth would cause the economic problems such as a declining per capita income and the unemployment. Hence, he suggested government to implement population control policy like family planning policies to avoid over population growth and also the economic disaster. For example, one child policy was implemented in China. The Chinese government said that 400million births were prevented. This means that the fertility rate in China decreased and thus it slows down the population

He mentioned that increases in population will bring worse situation to a country and all subsequent generations will suffer. For example, population growth would cause malnutrition and hunger which results from poverty problem. This means that population growth will worsen the country’s economic development. Furthermore, the statement of Samuelson also supported by Meier. The larger the population, the greater the amount of financial are needed to provide the need for social infrastructure, according to Meier (1995). Meier also point out that rapid population growth is more likely to lower savings per capita and slows down the growth of physical capital per worker. As a result, the economic growth will also