This is a good example where black and white thinking is dangerous. Some people have more control over their circumstances than others. That includes parents providing (or not) for their children. You don't need to be an apologist for bad parenting to acknowledge that human circumstances are due to some combination of choices, intrinsic nature, and environment.
I don't think the majority of the poverty problem comes from otherwise well to do parents falling on hard luck. At least in South Africa and I would think most of the rest of Africa this is not the case. If people just made sure to be in a position where they have the capability to provide for children at the point in time when they have them the poverty issue will be almost entirely gone.
And already just something as simple as providing a two parent household and not having children before 25 already virtually guarantees that they will not be impoverished:
- https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/dont-deny-the-link-b...
- https://www.businessinsider.com/parents-determine-child-succ...
I don't disagree - competent people, who have learned successful strategies, are unlikely to be reduced to permanent poverty except in extreme cases.
However, for those born into poverty, growing up surrounded by ignorance and lack of stimulation does make it exceedingly difficult to learn necessary life strategies to begin the slow, often times multigenerational climb out of poverty. First and foremost, what no one is willing to admit, combating poverty, at least in first world nations, really comes down to combating culture. And because a large proportion of certain (not all) minorities live within this culture, the idea of changing their way of life, even if you think it's ostensibly for the better, is understandably a sensitive subject.
But the way we dance around it isn't doing anyone any favors.