The Malthusian-Microeconomic Approach
The second approach, which we have called Malthusian-microeconomic, is probably the best known and most often referred to when it is necessary to connect economic analysis to the theory of population.
We called this orientation Malthusian because, after the publication of Malthus’s Essay, the long debate that took place in economic thinking right down to the present day, used Malthus’s approach as its main theoretical reference point.In the first edition of the Essay, Malthus’s argument is directed to confuting the idea of progress and human perfectibility put forward by Condorcet and Godwin. Godwin defended the principle of the “substantial equality” of men, whereas Condorcet’s conception of history saw mankind characterized by a perfectible nature. For both, the suffering of the lower classes derives from the structure of a society’s government and of the institutions operating within it. According to Malthus, Godwin and Condorcet’s theories had no scientific validity, since they were based on assumptions that could not be empirically verified. By contrast, he formulated two postulates:
First, That food is necessary to the existence of man.
Secondly, That the passion between the sexes is necessary and will remain nearly in its present state.
These two laws, ever since we have had any knowledge of mankind, appear to have been fixed laws of our nature; and, as we have not hitherto seen any alteration in them, we have no right to conclude that they will ever cease to be what they now are..................................................................... Assuming then, my postulata as
granted, I say, that the power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man. (Malthus 1798: 4)
In short, Malthus argued that when population grows there is a decrease in the amount of available resources for the sustenance of workers and, in parallel, through the reduction of wages that are pushed to subsistence level by the rising prices of essential goods, there is a decrease in per capita income and, as a result, in population.
To summarize this process Malthus uses his famous progressions: geometrical for population growth and arithmetical for the increase of resources. If population growth is at its full potential, the population tends to increase according to a geometrical progression, which in absolute terms doubles the number of people every 25 years. Food production cannot keep up with this impetuous process of population growth, which means that population growth, when not hampered by preventive measures, is still reduced by repressive checks: hunger, disease, war, and so on.This schema leaves no room for technical progress. For this reason, the modern representation of this argument is called the Malthusian population trap (see Todaro 2000: 224-9). The trap lies in the fact that individuals’ higher income is compensated by the increase in population. This schema essentially represents a stable equilibrium characterized by low levels of income per capita and relatively high levels of population growth. The mechanism described by the trap is avoided when there are intervening changes that break up the interplay of action and reaction in the variables involved. At a micro level, this happens when the increase in income is not accompanied by an increase in population because individuals’ reproductive behaviour has changed. At a macro level, the trap is avoided when continual technical progress raises the level of total production and, even with population increases, also the level of per capita income. This is the case described by Smith. In conclusion, seeing that Malthus does not consider technical progress to be a decisive factor in escaping from the trap, he relies on a micro level modification, suggesting in the Essay a “new” model of individual behaviour for workers.
The main objective of Malthus’s Essay is to show that through the implementation of preventive checks, which are essentially abstinence from sex and the delay in marriage, what is called moral restraint starting from the second edition of 1803, it is possible to improve the condition of workers.
This sense of responsibility can only arise from the perspective of poverty and, therefore, if public charity deletes this need it perpetuates the causes of the misery of the workers and population growth. Malthus wanted to show that the poverty of the workers did not depend on institutional and economic injustice, but was determined by individuals’ decisions concerning reproduction. Only the transition from a biological reproductive model to a “conscious” reproductive model would lead to a reduction in population growth and an increase in income per capita.In the general terms expressed by Malthus, this explanation of the causes of population growth and the reflections on the effects on the economy influenced the theoretical analysis of classical authors such as David Ricardo, John Ramsay McCulloch, Jean Baptiste Say and John Stuart Mill.
The aspect that most distinguishes this orientation is the microeconomic approach to the study of population and demographic dynamics. In other words, for Malthus and the authors cited, population increase is explained by the assumptions about the reproductive behaviour of individual family groups. The couple’s decision to put children into the world, when it is not accompanied by a calculation on future disposable income, generates an overpopulation of the working poor.
As for the normative approach, referring to policies considered necessary to correct the tendency to overpopulation, there was more than one position. According to J.S. Mill, the solution to the problem of population growth over the limit set by available subsistence is birth control through the dissemination and the legalization of contraceptive methods. For the other authors, on the contrary, the state should not intervene in family planning through targeted policies because “modern” reproductive decisions must emerge spontaneously from the conduct of workers. Any policy, from the Poor Laws to birth control, which hindered the “moral” formation of workers, could only worsen the poverty of the working class.