Comment by ironman1478

This. Poverty doesn't just cause immediate issues it can also cause long term issues that can effect not only adults, but the children who grew up in that environment. This is largely because families in poverty tend to also abuse their kids at higher rates (this includes mental abuse) or at least foster an extremely unhealthy environment due to the stress it causes. So even a generation later it can be difficult for a family tree to be lifted out of that situation. It's brutal not having a support system in place for people. What sucks is that it's probably bad for overall productivity to not help people in these situations, but the usa has chosen to say screw it for many years (hopefully that is changing).

Imo forget being "rich", just growing up in a relatively sane environment is an advantage.