ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the analytical structure behind Malthus's analysis of the relation between population growth and economic growth and to evaluate its usefulness by using it to address a variety of issues and to suggest that Malthus's analysis has much to recommend it. Malthus is regarded as the first major economist to discuss the interaction between economic and population growth in a systematic manner, and his Essay on the Principle of Population is still considered a classic on population, the economy and society and read widely as a Western Great Book. Malthus's dismal prognosis regarding economic and population growth has not come true. Much of the world does not live at subsistence, although many undoubtedly do, but for reasons not necessarily connected with Malthus's diagnosis. Malthus has often been interpreted as an early exponent of the theory of aggregate demand.
