Social Issue Essay, Research Paper

The population of our planet will quickly reach a point, where there will not be an adequate amount of resources to support life on Earth. Population control must be enforced to avoid such a catastrophic occurrence. Many, economic, social and environmental problems are either affiliated with or are increased due to overpopulation. With an exponentially increasing world population, the problems created by overpopulation grow correspondingly. In order to stabilize the massive population, the world must work together to maintain population stability.

Population- the inhabitants of a given area, but perhaps most importantly, the human inhabitants of the Earth (numbering about 5.4 billion in 1992), Who by their increasing numbers and corresponding increasing needs can seriously affect the global ecosystem.

What is the Population Myth?

The idea that population growth is the key cause of ecological problems is extremely commonplace. Truth. (Dean Fraser, The People Problem). Capitalism is the main cause of both overpopulation and ecological crisis. Population growth, far from being the cause of poverty, is in fact the result of it. Obviously, immediately provide better education and access to contraceptives across the planet as well as raising the elite by keeping the cost of labor . To see such developments as primary causes of population growth is to ignore the central role played by poverty, the disruption of cultural patterns, and the need for cheap labor due to capitalism (Murray Bookchin).

General population increase in the world was non-existent until the Industrial Revolution. From the time of the Roman Empire to the colonialization of America, the world population grew from about a quarter billion to a half-billion persons. By the mid- 19th century, however, it had grown to about one billion, and by 1930 it had risen to about 2 billion; the United Nation estimates the current world population will double around 2050. In world terms, a birth rate of 35 to 40 persons per 1000 population per year combined with a death rate of 15 to 20 persons in producing a 1.75% annual increase in the population. Although a 1.75% growth rate may appear small, it annually adds up, for example, almost 9 million persons to India s population and almost 4 million to that of the United States. In the late 20th century, a major population difference arose in the growth rates of the developed (0.6 %) and developing ( 2.1%) nations Africa s annual growth is about 3% compared to 1.7% for Asia, 0.7% in Latin America, and 0.3% in Europe. If current rates hold steady, many developing countries will double their population in 25 years or less, compared to 50 years or more for industrialized nations.

A declining birthrate depends to a large extent on the availability and use of birth control and on high living standards that make the production of additional children to provide necessary an inexpensive labor. The birth rate in developing countries has escalated from just more than six children per couple in 1950 to just more than 3 per couple today. The major explanation for smaller family sizes, has been economic growth, not condom distributions or coercive birth control measures. The modern movement for birth control began in Great Britain, where the writings of Thomas Malthus stirred interest in the problem of overpopulation. Thomas Malthus (1766-1834), English economist, sociologist, and pioneer in modern population Study. In An Essay on the Principle of Population (1798, rev. ed. 1803), he contended that poverty and distress are unavoidable. Malthus first accepted only war, famine, and disease. Although his theory caused controversy, it was later adapted by neo-Malthusians, and it influenced classical economists.

Classical economics- a system or school of economics thought developed by Adam Smith, Jeremy Bentham, Thomas Malthus, and David Ricardo, advocating minimum governmental intervention, free enterprise and free trade, considering labor the source of wealth and dealing with problems concerning overpopulation.

Marking the bicentennial of Thomas Malthus legendary essay on the tendency for population to grow more rapidly than the food supply, this study creates another half-century of population growth. Today, two centuries after Malthus, we find ourselves in a divided world, one where theories of population growth varies more widely than any time in history. In some countries, population has stabilized or is declining.

As the world enters the new millenium, it faces many challenges, but perhaps none so important or as urgent as the need to quickly slow population

growth. Today mankind reaches a new milestone, 6 billion people living on the Earth. Too bad so many are malthusian declinists, who regard all human beings as destroyers of the planet. When people are educated to the benefits of limiting family sizes, they respond with lower birth rates. Education, coupled with economics pressure, will end overpopulation problem and ease many of the other problems faced by today s society.

Work Cited

Davis, Kingsley. Resources, Environment and Population. (1991).

Fraser, Dean. The People Problem. (1971).

Hauser .P, Population and the Urban Future.

Turner Michael, ed., Malthus and his Time. (1986).