It was Robert Malthus who proposed a systematic theory of population which he wrote in his famous book, Essay on the Principle of Population, firstly published in 1798. He suggested that population will grow exponentially while food production grows at an arithmetic rate. Thus, there would come a period in which people would have no food to eat. This hypothesis then became the reference in the creation of birth controls and a revolution in agriculture sector.
According to Malthus’ theory, population might pose a serious threat especially when dealing with resources’ scarcity. However, population or in other words the people is an important factor of production that a country must need in order to run the economy.
The power of population that can drive a country’s economy can be clearly seen in China and India. They are consecutively the most populous countries followed by the US. As we can observe, the two countries has enjoyed miraculous economic growth for decades. Whilst India seems to still enjoying the demographic bonus, China, on the other hand is now facing economic slowdown that many expert says it might due to the aging population.
How about Indonesia?
Indonesia is the forth populous country following the US that noticeably is now enjoying the demographic bonus or demographic dividend era. It means the number of productive age is big whilst the burden of non-productive age (elderly and child) is getting smaller. The consequence is higher potential economic growth.
Such potential is indeed an opportunity for Indonesia to follow the success of China. China’s population contributes about 30% to its economic success. Yet, such big number of productive age can pose some serious threat if our government cannot manage it carefully.
Without proper job opportunity, these people will just be a burden as they are unemployed and might contribute to crime. But, without proper skills and education, they would not be able to get a proper job. This problem will be more serious if the government is not immediately solve it as the more product of “baby boom period” will enter the job market in the near future.
Some recommendation for this potential threat is that the government need to reform the education system which might no more relevant with what job market needs. There need to be some adjustment especially because our education nowadays is still lack of creativity and still too cognitive-heavy. Being a good worker is not simply being smart, but also need to be adaptive, creative, emotionally healthy, and highly motivated.
