On the Long-Run Relationship between Population and Economic Growth: Some Time Series Evidence for Developing Countries

This paper focuses on the relationship between population growth and economic growth in many developing countries. Our results from the Johansen cointegration test and error-correction models are supportive of Simon's (1989) theory that population growth and economic growth exhibit a potent long-run (rather than a short-run) relationship across countries. The results further suggest that population expansion positively contributes to economic development in the majority of the countries examined. However, causality inferences are not uniform across countries and the results appear sensitive to the particular stage of economic development.