Note 1037 — IX THE REGULATION OF NUMBERS AMONG PRIMITIVE RACES
Reading edition
Cannan, Wealth, p. 68. This is frequently misunderstood. Thus we read that ‘occasionally, from accidental circumstances, England was for a short time under-populated, and these were the periods when ... the labourer was well off’ (Inge, loc. cit., p. 90). The evidence alluded to would tend to show that there was previously a condition of over-population. In any case a people as a whole is not better off when under-population arises.