Critical Minimum Effort Thesis

The economic, political and social  conditions in under- developed countries are such as to make their growing population inimical to economic growth . Most of the economists are of the view that many under developed countries. Especially of the South East Asian countries, are over populated and the population pressure is a great barrier is the way of their economic development and unless this barrier is broken all efforts at accelerating economic growth will prove futile. However a way out of this population barrier has been suffused in the form of a critical minimum effort the critical minimum effort thesis has been put forward by Prof. Harvey According to him, the under-developed over populated countries are in a Malthusian Under employment Equilibrium position based  on a subsistence structure. He quotes DuPont’s capillarity thesis  according to which when a community realizes that there are greater chances to rise socially with a fewer children than with a larger family, there is change in social attitudes and strong motivation for restricting the family as per capita income rises.