第二次世界大战后,地处太平洋东端的日本在战争的废墟上重建家园,重新实现经济腾飞,跃为世界经济强国,东亚的南朝鲜、香港、台湾和东南亚的新加坡也励精图治,完成了经济起飞。这些亚洲国家和地区的经济成就举世瞩目,人们通常把这归咎于天时(良好的国际环境)、地利(有利的地理位置)和人和(卓越的管理、稳定的政治等),而这些国家在经济起飞同时进行的人口转变因素却被忽略,本文算是对此的拾遗补缺。人口转变理论是西方人口学家汤普逊(W·S·Thompson)、诺特斯坦、布莱克(C·P·Blacker)、朗德里(A·Landry)等人,对西方老牌发达国家经济发展过程中人口演变情况的概括性总结。它认为,各国的人口变化大致经历了如下三个阶段:从第一阶段的高出生率、高死亡率、低自然增长率的人口缓慢发展,经历高出生率、低死亡率、高自然增长率的人口迅速增长阶段,在工业化后发生了人口转变,进入低出生率、低死亡率、低自然增长率的人口稳定、停滞阶段。从第 After the Second World War, Japan, located at the eastern end of the Pacific Ocean, rebuilt its homeland on the ruins of the war and regained its economic take-off and leapt to a world economic power. So did South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Southeast Asia in East Asia. take off. These Asian countries and regions have made remarkable achievements in their economy. People usually attribute this to the favorable climate (favorable international environment), geographical location (favorable geographical location), and people (excellent management, stable politics, etc.) Economic demise took place at the same time the factor of demographic transition has been neglected, this article can be regarded as a supplement to fill this vacancy. The demographic transition theory is the result of Western demographers W. Thompson, N. Nestein, C. Black, Landry and others on the process of economic development in the established western developed countries Summary of population evolution. It believes that the demographic changes in various countries have generally gone through three stages: from the first phase of the high birth rate, high mortality rate, the slow growth of the population with low natural growth rate, the population with the high birth rate, the low mortality rate and the high natural growth rate During the rapid growth phase, a population shift has taken place after industrialization, leading to a stable and stagnant population with low birth rates, low death rates and low rates of natural increase. From the first