a.       There is an indirect negative relationship between the birth rate and GDP per capita of a country. Generally, as the GDP per capita increases, the birth rate decreases.

b.      There are many reasons why the developing countries have a higher birth rate and a lower GDP. Generally, people in developing countries need children to support and help them. The economies of many developing countries depends on agriculture; thus children are wanted to help with farming. A second reason is that parents expect some of their children to die because of the high infant mortality rate. For instance, in Afghanistan, the infant mortality rate is 165.96 deaths/1000 live births. Parents need these children to support them when they get old or sick, since there may not be an old age pension scheme in effect. They need to have more children to ensure that a few will stay alive. In Canada, we are fortunate to have the RRSP program, which gives tax benefits for retirement. People in most developed countries have less kids because it is more expensive to raise them. Also, women in developed countries like to undertake careers that do not allow them to stay at home.  

c.       The twenty countries were categorized into three groups: developing, developed, and newly industrialized. Developing countries had a birth rate higher than 34, and a GDP per capita less than $5000 US. Newly industrialized countries had a birth rate between 13.5 and 21 and a GDP per capita between $5000 and $150000. Developed countries had a birth rate less than 13.5 and a GDP per capita of higher than $35000 US.  There were eight outliers. They were United States, Philippines, Zimbabwe, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, India, Ethiopia, and Afghanistan. It was difficult assigning these countries a group because they did not follow the trend (i.e. the higher the GDP, the lower the literacy rate). For instance, Singapore and the United States had a low birth rate, but a high GDP per capita. Newly industrialized countries fall in he middle of developing and developed countries. They have a higher GDP than developed countries, but a lower birth rate than developing countries.