Population growth is widely regarded as self-evidently a cause of poverty and backwardness in Third World countries. In this Occasional Paper, Lord Bauer challenges this belief and argues that population growth represents a gain in welfare: not only are the great majority of children wanted and planned by their parents, but individuals live longer as their living conditions rise. Population growth can also be a stimulus to economic development: populations has risen rapidly in many of the Third World countries now growing out of poverty, but remains low in many of those that most frequently experience famines.

According to Lord Bauer, ‘The central issue is whether the number of children people have should be decided by parents or by agents of the state’.