Chapter 21 Long-term consequences of population growth: Technological change, natural resources, and the environment

This chapter explores the long-term implications of population growth and its interaction with technological change, resources utilization, and the environment. The interaction among economic growth, population dynamics, and resource use is complex and the jointly endogenous outcome of the whole process of evolution and development of the economic and social system. While, in the long run, population size and growth may not be a key issue in the process of development, it may be an important issue in the short run. This is so because most of the costs are in short run, while the benefits are enjoyed over longer time scales. As such, population policy may be useful in allowing any benefits to accrue. The theoretical literature on fertility and population growth also needs to be extended to allow for more disaggregated models of household decision-making and for a better integration with the social environment. Most environmental disasters are because of the same types of problems that themselves impede developmentinefficient policies, the failure to enforce property rights, or inefficient structures of incentives. It is the interaction of population growth with these that causes it to have its worst effects.