China's Rising Population Analysis

According to Joseph Needham’s work in Science and Civilization in China, the Chinese innovations of gunpowder, magnetic compass and printing prove that China was at least more technologically advanced than Europe by 1400. However, the Europe economy was clearly more prosperous than China 400 years later where Europeans enjoyed significant improvements in living standards. The differences in incomes and technology between China and Europe was called the “Great Divergence”. Thomas Malthus believes that the massive rising population was the main cause for China’s lagging economy. Since Europe which also had increasing population had escaped from the Malthusian Trap, other factors such as law and institutions, the role of trade and incentives must

The

Chinese silver wages fell from 39% of the Britain’s silver wage in 16th century to only 15% by

1849. The Engel’s law states that as consumers’ incomes rise, the proportion of the income spent on food decreases. The relatively stable grain wages in Chins indicates the divergence of the standard of living between China and Europe happened as early as in the 16th century in terms of manufactured goods and services. The Chinese living standards was approaching back to the subsistence level due to the massive population according Malthus’ theory.

Malthus believes that “ early marriages very generally prevail through all the rank of the

Chinese” was one of the main reason for this massive population in China (Malthus 1798,

Pg 19). Additionally, positive checks were essential to control down the population because of the lack of preventive checks such as birth control and moral constraints in China. The

Malthusian factors were sufficient to a great extent as Malthus’ positive checks, for instance, plague and war did happen to bring the population down in China during the “Mongol interlude” and late Ming

Institutions are “the rules of game in a society”(North 1991, pg1) , which is however not included in the Malthusian factors.

Adam Smith has recognized that the China has long been one of the the richest and most populous countries in the world, but was surpassed by Europe in 1750s (Smith, 1776). During the “Song Peak”, China had a powerful centralised government with sophisticated monetary system. The commercial class was prosperous at that time when paper money was firstly invented and silks, cottons were trade extensively. The decentralised government in

Ming/Qing dynasties restricted foreign trade and focused on agriculture. Smith emphasized that the large internal market in China could not replace the foreign trade and blamed

China’s isolationism and the lack of secure property rights for the lagging economic growth in the country. However, some Revisionists argued that Chinese had similar incomes as the

Europeans in the 18th century.

There are also a group of theorists called the California School believes in the “late divergence” between China and Europe which happened in the late Qing dynasty. They reject the factors of both Malthusian and Smithian model, and emphasized the importance of