Lecture X2 Population.pptVIP

Lecture 2 Population Outline Does China have a population problem? Why and why not? Facts about population growth. Economic explanation of the rate of population growth. One-child family policy. Advantages of having a large population Recent newspaper articles about China’s population problem. Facts about population growth Total population increased from 574.8 million in 1952 to 987.0 million in 1980 and 1.3 billion in 2009. (US population 300 million in 2009). The exponential rate of increase per year before 1980 was 0.0193 and since 1980 was 0.0120. The proportion of rural population was 87.54 percent in 1952, 82.08 per cent in 1978 and 60 percent in 2008, showing the high degree of urbanization since 1978. The “natural” rate of population growth, i.e., the increase per 1000 persons per year, is the difference between the birth rate and the death rate, assuming no net migration to or from the country concerned. The death rate in China decreased steadily from the 1950s to the 1970s, reaching 6.25 per 1000 in 1978. This is an indication of the great improvement in health care in China during this period. In other countries, as the economy developed, the death rate declined. In Taiwan, for example, the death rate decreased from 9.9 per 1000 in 1952 to 4.7 in 1979, while the infant death rate decreased from 37.2 per 1000 to 9.8 during the same period. Economic explanation of the decline in the birth rate A most important result of economic development is that while the death rate declines, the birth rate will eventually decline by even more, so that the natural rate of population growth will decrease significantly. This has happened in country after country in Western Europe, in the United States and in Japan. Japan and Singapore now encourage people to have more children. Cost and benefit analysis of having children. Cost: In cities cost of living (housing, food and schooling) for children is high. Cost of the mother’s is time high. Benefit : in rural areas cos