Awhile ago, there was a study done on infants which were born addicted to hard drugs.
Their final conclusion was that being born into poverty is a far more debilitating and crippling condition than being born addicted to crack or assorted hard drugs.
The mentalities, attitudes, conditions and values which lead to people being in poverty could be contagious and harmful to human development. And so being born into that environment and being in constant contact with those living that life could have severe negative effects upon a person's mindset, attitude and soul.
That's the best I can come up with atm.
It would really take someone who gets lucky, or was able to have this inbuilt challenging spirit to be able to get out of it, most especially when exposed to such environment from birth.