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If it wasn't for the potato famine...

Posted Tuesday, March 9, 2010

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Ireland's Population

In 1841 Ireland's population was more than 8 million.

The population of England & Wales was 16 million then.

The population of Scotland was 2.6 million.

Potato Famine

Ireland's population slumped during the potato famine and till this day hasn't reached the levels it was then.

There's very few countries that haven't increased their population massively since 1841.

It is now 4.5m in the South and 1.7m in the North making it a joint total of 6.2m.

Scotland

Scotland's population has doubled to about 5.2m.

If Ireland's population had doubled there would now be 16m Irishmen and women.

England

The population of England and Wales is now 54m with England 51m and Wales 3m.

That means that the population of England and Wales is three and a half what it was in 1841.

Bigger

If the Irish population had increased by the same rate as the English population then its population would now be 28m.

So, without the potato famine and other factors that previously kept the population down the best guess would be an Irish population of somewhere between 16m and 28m.

At the lower end of the scale it would be around the same population as Holland (16m) and bigger than Belgium (10m) or Austria (8m).

Bigger Than Australia

At the upper end it would be bigger than Australia (21m) and it would be more than half the size of some of the big boys of Europe like Spain and Italy.

It would be quite an important country on the European scene.

The population was starting to grow quite nicely again before the recent recession but Ireland obviously has room for a lot more people - and may grow in importance again after they sort out the current mess.