Thomas robert malthus brief biography

British political economist (1766–1834)

"Malthus" redirects here. For the demon Halphas, sometimes called Malthus, see Halphas.

Thomas Robert MalthusFRS (; 13/14 February 1766 – 29 December 1834)^[1] was an English economist, cleric, and scholar influential in the fields of political economy and demography.^[2]

In his 1798 book An Essay on the Principle of Population, Malthus observed that an increase in a nation's food production improved the well-being of the population, but the improvement was temporary because it led to population growth, which in turn restored the original per capita production level. In other words, humans had a propensity to use abundance for population growth rather than for maintaining a high standard of living, a view and stance that has become known as the "Malthusian trap" or the "Malthusian spectre". Populations had a tendency to grow until the lower class suffered hardship, want and greater susceptibili