1986/11/01 by Paul Demeny · 97 citations
Psychology · Social Sciences · #Autonomy #Economics #Income, Poverty, and Inequality #Invisible hand #Law #Multitude #Neoclassical economics #Political science #Politics #Population #Psychology #Redistribution (election) #Social psychology #Socialization #Sociology
paper · pdf · doi:10.2307/2061346
published in Demography 23(4), 473-487 (Springer Science+Business Media)
openalex publication_date 1986/11/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
This paper discusses the validity of the belief that the invisible hand can work to shape population processes. It also comments on the contemporary policy agenda and the debates that surround it. The outcome of the invisible hand is an uncoordinated social process based on the self-seeking actions of a multitude of independent agents. Demographic change becomes a matter for public concern whenever it can plausibly be assumed that such modifications are both desirable and possible. The workings of the invisible hand are not always for the better. Malthus a firm believer in the invisible hand in effect assumed that people are full masters of their fate acting in isolation and that 1 way they can improve their material standing is by exercising prudent judgment when making choices including choices in demographic matters. Capitalist development in the West ostensibley left most facets of demographic behavior to the individual and to the individual couple. Major forces that condition individual choices are however determined by forces outside individual control. There are 4 areas of fertility-affecting influences; the deceasing economic benefit and the increasing direct cost of children to parents; the rising opportunity cost of children; the socialization of old-age support; and the confluence of demographic change and political institutions that effect the pattern of income redistribution by the state.