Thomas Malthus’ pessimistic view on population
Introduction
The human population within the past century has become a substantial phenomenon as it records a total of only 40 years for it to double from 2.5 billions which existed in the 19 50s to 5 billion people existing in the present world. While this doubling is far less that the average lifetime of human kind, evidence has shown that the world population is bound to pass 6 billion even the end of 20th century. A number of factors have been identified to contributing to the rapidly growing human population among which includes time, initial population, fertility and mortality, and these as a result have significantly contributed to a substantial level of underdevelopment across the globe.
Thomas Malthus’ pessimistic view on population
Thomas Robert Malthus who was a prominent English scholar that had rendered a significant level of influence on demography and political economy is widely known for his influential theories about population in relation to is decrease or increase depending on a number of factors. According to Birbsall (2001), Malthus between 1798 and 1826 has published a number of materials in his famous treatise in which he addressed criticism in order to express changes on the subject in relation to his, own views. While he had written these materials with the aim of expressing his ideas on how to improve human population, he saw every human population as being relegated by poverty. According to Thomas, every human population grew and expanded in regions and times of plenty until the size of population started to cause distress as primary resources continued to become scarce. Even though there are certain populations that are bound to be vicious, this tendency of virtuous attachment is strong and as such, it forms a constant effort towards a rise in population. This effort thus tends to subject the lower class populations to a stressful situation as they seek to fight against a more permanent amelioration of their situation.
Explanations for missing girls and women in the world’s population
The severe shortfall of the number of female population relative to the number that would be expected to prevail among a given number of their male counterparts has raised concern as was first noted by the Indian winner of the first Nobel Prize who noted that more than 100 million women were missing from the world’s population contrary to the potential estimation of their existence. Apparently, while it is obvious that their current population has been tampered with and thus the more explanation as to why women’s population is not naturally really, especially in china, Asia and India, number factors have been blamed for this population status. According to Birbsall (2001), the legacy of population control has centrally been blamed for this issue. Even as it is evident that a number of countries are putting up restrictions as pertains to the number of children that each family ought to have, most family have sought for selective abortion in which women have preferred to terminate girl-child pregnancies in preference for a boy child and this causes the ultimate world that is full of men and very few women. This practice is particularly common in China where the government allows not more than one child for every family in favor of their economic system, and as a result, most families prefer to have pre-natal determination of sex of the child and while their preference is skewed towards male children, unnatural abortions in favor of male children arte conducted thus attributing to an ultimate population that is full of men.
Present value
Present value refers to the value which is stated on a given date representing a single of a series of future payments which have been discounted in order to reflect the monetary time value together with other factors. According to Birbsall (2001), present value basically involves the current value that is equivalent to the sum of money of stream of cash flow to be employed in the future in relation to a given rate of return. Basically, future cash flows are usually discounted at the present discount rate which means that higher discount rates at the present value indicate lower present value of the future cash flows. Although it is evident that precise determination of the future cash flow using present value might be a tricky activity to undertake, it is obvious that determination of the correct discount rate is the prime activity in valuing the future cash flows. From Birbsall’s point if argument, calculation of future cash flows is substantial as they facilitate the calculation of net present values, spot rates, bond yields and pension obligations.
Internal rate of return
According to Birbsall (2001), internal rate of return refers to the rate of return that is used in capital budgeting in order to weight and contrast the profitability in a number of investments. These rates are basically used to analyze the desirable outcomes of an investment of project. From Birbsall’s point of view, high internal returns within a project mean high desirability for one to undertake the project. The internal rate of return is usually utilized as an indicator of the quality, efficiency and yield of any given investment which means that an investment is bound to be considered worthwhile if its internal return is higher than an established acceptable minimum rate of return.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is apparent that Thomas’ publication on population sought to express the fact that high population was the contributor of severe rates of poverty. The legacy of population control is the central cause for missing female members of Chinese, Indian and Asian populations as it attributes to unnatural selective abortion.
Reference
Birbsall, N. et al. (2001). Population Matters: Demographic Change, Economic Growth and Poverty in the Developing World. Oxford University Press. New York.
