Population Growth

Population Growth

Introduction

Since 1950, world population has doubled and today the number of inhabitants is around 6,000 million. In this sense, population growth is of global concern. However, this growth is not homogeneous, there are periods of decreased and / or increasing, in turn, has also varied from one to other geographic areas. The causes of rapid population growth are many; the key is the reduction in mortality. This decrease occurred as a result of medical advances, economic and technological developments that allowed the disappearance of epidemics and the spread of new manufacturing techniques (Cho, 2000). The expansion of this progress in developing countries occurred rapidly, parallel to the existence of high birth rates, leading to the phenomenon of population explosion.

Discussion

In developed countries the situation is totally different, where the percentages of population are declining rapidly: 33.1% of the world total in 1950 to 22.8% in 1990 and 15.9% (estimated) in 2025. This is because fertility rates have fallen below replacement level: 2.1 children per woman. However, the population continues to grow in most countries due to the accumulation over time of potential growth (i.e. a proportion of young population that is now in their reproductive years), for rates above higher fertility than at present, or because of immigration from developing countries (Punch, 2000).

Europe is a special case within the group of developed countries because their growth rates are less than 1% annually and there are countries with negative values such as Germany, Italy, etc. This situation is due to low birth and mortality levels rising as a result of aging population structure. In America, the population is growing and has now reached 313,232,044 which have made it the third most populated country in the world. Besides the local population, there are also many emigrants who have entered the country in search of better lifestyles. The net migration rate is 4.18 migrants from 1000 people in the US CIA Factbook 2011. However, the increase in population has caused problems with regards to living areas. For the locals, there had already been a problem in searching for living space in the densely populated cities, in the US. Moreover, when the emigrants entered the country, this issue was further highlighted. Increase in demand of living space also resulted in an increase, in the prices of houses (Frey, 2000). Therefore, people started opting to live in places such as shared apartment, college dormitory or military base. In the future, the population will further increase. However, since the US is not giving visas to the people from other countries easily, this can help them control the population density in the country.

Experience with regards to population density in the US varied from one city to another. However, in the densely populated cities where most of the businesses operated, the demand for housing was high which also led to high prices of rent and cost of living. On an average, 87.4 inhabitants live in the US per square mile. However, Columbia is most populated with ...