Thomas Malthus

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The Writings of Thomas Malthus

The fame of the English economist Thomas Robert Malthus has remained because of his work "An Essay on the Principle of Population", published in 1798. In it he sought to show that increases in population will eventually diminish the ability of the world to feed itself. "...I say that the power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man." He based this conclusion on the thesis that populations expand in such a way as to overtake the possibility of adding enough land for crops. While some of Malthus' statements have been put aside by many economists, 20th-century worries over population growth brought him back into favor. The 1798 pamphlet was expanded into a book in 1803. The sixth and last edition of the work came out in 1826.
Malthus was born in Rookery, Surrey, England, in February 1766. He attended Cambridge University, earning a master's degree in 1791. In 1793 he was elected a fellow of Jesus College. He became professor of history and political economy in 1805 at the East India Company's college in Haileybury, Hertfordshire, and remained there the rest of his life. He died on Dec. 23, 1834.
Malthus was a pessimist who viewed the popular notion of human perfectibility as foolishness. As he continued studying economics, he became concerned with problems of supply and demand, gluts of goods, and recessions. He saw saving as a threat to production because it diminishes purchasing power.....