The Age of Scarcity?

Rising populations. Skyrocketing commodity prices. Strains on natural resources. Is this our Malthusian moment?

Is the ghost of Thomas Robert Malthus stalking the global economy? Sad to say, it sure seems like it.

Malthus was a key figure in the 18th and early 19th

century in developing modern mainstream economics.

(And Darwin hit on the idea of natural selection after

reading Malthus’ Essay on Population.) But Malthus is best remembered for his grim argument that

there is a tendency from “the wretched inhabitants of

Tierra del Fuego” to “the beggars of Teshoo Loomboo”

for population growth to outstrip resources.


The grim dynamic runs along these lines: Growing incomes lead to increased fertility and reduced mortality. That means there are more mouths to feed on the same land. Growth and income fall. The process repeats itself, over and over again. Little wonder the Victorian historian Thomas Carlyle described Malthus as “Dreary, stolid, dismal, without hope for this world or the next.”

Evidence for the Pessimists

In the 21st century, the worry revolves around the dramatic expansion of the global economy and consumer purchasing power in China, India, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Russia, and other emerging markets. The rise of the frontier economies is putting too great a strain on natural resources. The price increases we’re witnessing aren’t a temporary market dislocation, but a permanent shift into an Age of Scarcity.

Could the pessimists be right?

Business Week