Economic Development
...1 countries with the fastest population growth." The position I have elected to take is more persuasive than the other three stated at the beginning of this essay. It is more persuasive because the reasons given to support this position are backed up by credible sources like the GDP trends stated earlier by the U.S. Department of Health. Furthermore it is safe to say that a bigger population leads to more unemployment. If population growth were to slow down, the chances of getting higher paying jobs would increase as unemployment decreased and this way countries could invest in better education, health care, job creation, and other improvements rather then focusing entirely on unemployment related issues. This is why stating that population growth is unrelated to economic development, or that population growth stimulates economic development is ludicrous. Furthermore, arguing that economic development determines population growth is not acceptable because in order for there to be economic growth, population growth must be slowed first. Criticisms against my point of view (that population growth impedes economic development) such as Aiding Development, which is an article published by the U.S. Department of Health, say that "in theory population growth might provide an economic advantage because more people could be working, produce more, and thus raise national income levels." I agree that more people could be working, and producing more, but there will always come a point where all jobs will be taken, and unemployment becomes a big issue. To support this I will put Ghana as an example. According to "Population growth and development in low income countries," by Coal and Hoover, "a slower rate of population growth will ensure that more people in Ghana will have better access to health care and social amenities. In Ghana, the warning that rapid population growth could be an obstacle to the development of their economy was not taken seriously by previous governments. There was a large influx of foreign nationals, particularly those from sister African countries. This was confirmed in the 1960 population census in which 12.3 percent of the population was estimated to be foreigners. The situation persisted until 1969 when the issues of population was recognized as a critical factor in the development of their economy by intellectuals as well as the political leaders of this country. Ghana then became the third country in Sub-Saharan Africa to come out with a comprehensive population policy in 1969 after Mauritius and Kenya. Rapid population growth means higher dependency burden which forces the young population to work to supplement the family income. It also creates social pressures on the government to spend more on the welfare of the people in order to ma...