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Does size matter? An economic perspective on the population debate : Comments
By Andrew Leigh, published 28/3/2014Population growth has the potential to get us things we cannot obtain in other ways: better cultural goods and a more productive, more entrepreneurial culture. A larger nation has more mouths, but also more minds.
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"We have the third-lowest population density of any country. Only Mongolia and Namibia have fewer people per hectare than Australia"
Yes, there's a good reason for that, like Australia, Mongolia and Namibia are mainly desert --what point is being made here, the amount of arable land in Australia is relatively small, so reference to overall population density is irrelevant. Brazil and the US can support populations of hundreds of millions, not Australia.
There are many countries with smaller populations than Australia which have prosperous economies, their people actually manufacture products and trade internationally, there's obviously enough smart people in Switzerland and Scandinavia.
There are facts and there's economic theory and, of course, vested interests.