I am quite willing to say that people are poor because they are lazy, stupid or lacking the skills needed to work in a modern society because their culture doesn't promote personal virtues needed by workers.

Having been essentially dumped on the street after high school, as my parents sold our family home and moved full time into a motor home, eliminating any safety net of use for me, (right in the midst of the early 1980's and stagflation!), I have known poverty. I was neither lazy, nor stupid, but lacking in the certifications required to prove that I had the required skills.

Sometimes shit just happens. I am not so quick to judge.

On the other hand, I am probably as well off now, because of the trial by fire. On the other, I don't know how I managed to turn down the offer to become a multi-lingual and cultured call girl, when I couldn't even afford to eat. I guess that Catholic upbringing had some backbone.

Walk in their shoes....

IP,
who will be eternally grateful to that random guy in Boston, who, as I passed by his apartment on the way to the laundromat, asked if I would like some leftover excess WIC food...feasted for a month on that pound of butter, 5 lbs of Velveta, and jar of honey