THOMAS MALTHUS Flashcards
Thomas Malthus what year
1766-1834
Addressed what
population growth methodology of gdp accounting value theory diminishing returns land returns land rent aggregate demand
Malthus background
father david was a distinguished english man
friend of jean jacques rousseau and david hume
Works: An essay on principle of population & principle of political economy
Historical settings
Increase in poverty
Corn laws-tarrifs on imported grain and placed a minimum price on grain imported to england from abroad
Who was Daniel?
Daniel was his father and was optimistic of people and society and he was influenced by Godwin and Condorcet, which in turn influence Malthus
Who was Godwin?
He was a minister , political philosopher turned anarchist and atheist. He opposed action by the state and action by the citizenry.
Becuase a person character is based on environment, then a perfect society will create perfect people
HIs optimism is what produce Malthusian pessimism.
Who was the Marquis of Condorcet?
He was a french mathman, skeptic of relgiion and physiocrat in economics.
For universal suffrage for men and women.
Opposed property qualification for voting and election to office.
He favored wide distribution of property , social security and universally free education for women and men.
Natural order leads towards economic equality but existing laws and institution encourage inequalities
What did Malthus not agree on?
Evils that plague society are due, not to evil human institutions but rather to the prolific
fertility of the human race
o The French thinkers (Condorcet) welfare programs would only counter a second factor
limiting population- hunger
o Godwin & Condorcet for revolution while Malthus appealed to conservatives as a sane
and able defence of the status quo
What was his Population Theory?
His focusnwas on poverty and misery observed among the lower classes of every nation and he beleibed it was cuz of population. He thought population , when uncheked, increased geometrically and subsistence ( food increased arithmetically)
What are the two types of checks to population growth?
preventive checks and postive checks
What is the preventive checks to population?
reduce birth rate - known as moral retraint
if you cant afford a child, dont have them and dont get married
no birth control or prostitution
What did people think about of Malthus preventive check plan ?
He wanted to maintain a large, hard working, poorly paid population that he was in establishing really effective measures of limiting human reproduction.
WHat is positive checks to population?
Increase the death rate by famine, misery, plague and war
natural phenomeno or laws , punishement to those who didn’t show moral restraint
What is the Poor Laws ?
Poverty and misery are natural punishment to lower class for failure to restrain reproduction. Malthus beleeived there should be no gov releif for the poor. the laws abolished all reflied for people outside workhouses.
In reality, what were workhouses?
Workhouses were social death, harsh psychologically and meat to be so unbearable people would do anything to avoid them.
