 Malthus's Criticism of Adam Smith and Dynamic Mechanism of Population in the First Edition of Principle of PopulationTaro Hisamatsu
No 1223, Discussion Papers from Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University Abstract: Two issues are addressed in this paper. First, we analyze with a simple mathematical model Thomas Robert Malthus's critique of Adam Smith, the most theoretically discussed part in the first edition of Principle of Population. Second, by introducing a differential equation for the dynamics of price, unlike most of the other present scholars, we explain Malthus's dynamic mechanism of population more in detail, and thereby reconsider and reinforce his idea of encouraging investment in agriculture discussed in his critique of Smith. Thereby, we show that under the assumption set forth by Malthus, economic development created by investment in agriculture is more desirable compared to investment in manufacturing, in the view of social welfare; that Malthus's idea implied some type of precursory Keynesian idea, that is, the creation through policy of effective demand to agriculture, not to manufacture, leads to economic growth with improvement in social welfare. Keywords: Malthus; Smith; mechanism of population; agriculture; dynamics of price (search for similar items in EconPapers) There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it. Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:koe:wpaper:1223 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in Discussion Papers from Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University Contact information at EDIRC. |
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