What Is Population Economics?

Population economics is a discipline that studies the interrelationship between population and economy. It is a marginal subject formed by the cross-penetration of demography and economics. It mainly examines the impact of population on the economy and the impact of population change on economic development. It also studies the economic roots or economic factors of population change. Demographics was formed in the 1930s. In 1939, the British economist Redway published a book "Economics of Population Reduction", firstly proposing the subject of population economics; in 1944, American economist Spengler published "Introduction to the Economics of Population Growth" In the article, the name of population economics was formally used. Western population economics has gradually formed two major branches of macro-demographic economics and micro-demographic economics from the middle and late 1950s. ^[1]

Population economics

(Subject name)

According to Julian L. Simon, an American population economist, population economics is an idiomatic economic discipline, and the discipline must be analyzed

Population economics was born as an emerging discipline in the early 1970s. However, due to the long history of population and economic issues, economists' discussion of the relationship between population and economy can be traced back to the second half of the 18th century.

The research object of population economics is the interrelationship between population and economy in the process of population economy, that is, the population economic relationship. On the one hand, it examines the restrictive effect of the economy on the population, on the other hand, it studies the effect of the population on the economy. Through these two aspects of investigation, reveal the relationship between population and economy and the regularity of its movement. The research contents mainly include: population and production, exchange, distribution, consumption and its changing laws; comprehensive balance of population and national economy; population and resources, population and ecological balance; population investment and economic investment; children's cost-benefit analysis.

mainly:

Investigation and statistical analysis. That is, a large number of economic data of the population is collected through surveys. After statistical grouping and synthesis, they are sorted out and analyzed to find out the internal connection of the population and economic movement.

Combining static analysis and dynamic analysis. This method not only makes a horizontal anatomy of the population and economic relations at a certain point in time, but also describes the changes in the population and economic relations in a certain period of time. The speed, direction, and trend of economic change.

Combining qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis. The former is an analysis of the qualitative regulations of the economic relations of the population, and the latter is to determine the quantitative limits of the economic phenomena of the population. The former can reveal the nature and characteristics of population economic phenomena under different modes of production, and the latter can reveal its quantitative performance, quantitative relations and quantitative changes. The two complement each other and are applied in the study of population economics.

The combination of macro analysis and micro analysis. The former studies the interaction of socio-economic factors and population from the perspective of society as a whole, while the latter studies the interrelationship between population development and economic development from the perspective of individuals or families. Combining the two organically can fully reveal the internal relationship between demographic and economic factors.

Demographics is somewhere between economics and

China's research on population economy was carried out in the early 1980s. Under the great situation of the reform and opening up of the economic system, some monographs on population economics have come out one after another. The more influential one is "Population Economics" (1983) edited by Zhang Chunyuan and others. Discusses the interrelationship and regularity of population and production, distribution, and consumption, examines the main content of macro demographic economics such as the proportional relationship between population and economic growth, population and environment and resources, and population change and economic development, and creatively proposes The concept of "optimal population economic benefits" was introduced to explore the problem of population growth and economic development. Since then, Peng Songjian's Introduction to Western Population Economics (1987) and Hu Angang's "Population and Development: A Systematic Study of China's Population and Economic Issues" (1989) have attracted attention. The former systematically discusses the formation process of population economics, the main population economics of various schools, and the general theories of western macro-population economics and micro-demographic economics. The latter conducted a systematic engineering analysis of population and labor employment, consumption, and resources, and discussed development models and their feasibility issues.

In the 1990s, some research results on population economics appeared. The article "Theoretical Models of Economic Interpretation of Family Reproductive Behavior Change in China" published by Jiang Zhenghua in 1993, from the perspective of micro-demographic economics, used the theoretical model of supply and demand and cost-benefit analysis of child production to make an empirical analysis of the fertility transition. Research, innovative. Zheng Zhixiao wrote the book "Population Economy" in 1994, which expounded the meaning of population and population economy, expounded the quantity and quality of population, the status of population distribution, demographic transition, and the impact of population investment on economic development, and looked forward to The future population and economic problems. In addition, Zhang Shiqing's Theoretical Research on Population and Economic Growth (1994), Tian Xueyuan's Sustainable Development of Population and Economic Environment (1996), and Li Jingneng's Theoretical Research on Population Economy (2000 ) And other academic achievements are more compelling. In general, the study of the discipline system, content, and related theory of comprehensive macro and micro comparative system of population economics in China is still in its infancy, compared with the theoretical system of western population economics that is becoming more and more mature. There is still a gap. Chinese scholars should boldly learn from some modern western scientific research methods and research results, expand the research field of population economics, and further improve and develop their theoretical system.