Breaking out of the Malthusian trap: How pandemics allow us to understand why our ancestors were stuck in poverty - Our World in Data

The Industrial Revolution ended the Maluthsian trap in which incomes were determined by the size of the population – making it possible for a country to leave abject poverty behind.

Home Economic Growth Note: Since the publication of this article, the World Bank has updated its poverty data. See the note at the end for more information. Poor material living conditions have been such a persistent and pervasive reality that, for much of human history, it was unimaginable that they could ever be different. Poverty did not change and so it was easy to believe that poverty was unchangeable. The Reverend Thomas Malthus wrote about the living conditions in his native England “It has appeared that from the inevitable laws of our nature, some human beings must suffer from want. Th

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