&gt; What facts, measurements or data (if any) would cause you to accept that his hypothesis is true?<p>Anything that provides strong evidence that no human action -- social or technological -- can possibly improve the fortune of the poor.<p>&gt; either genetics or behaviors taught by their parents<p>Even if that were true, I see no claim that they cannot change, so I don&#x27;t see why the cause matters. That people&#x27;s starting positions in life are widely unequal is pretty much a given; no one disputes that. In order to make a powerful claim, the only thing that matters is not the source of their misfortune, but that it cannot be changed. Genetic, &quot;wide&quot; social or &quot;close&quot; social (family), I see no such claim being made, and if anyone were to make that claim, I think that they have no good foundation to base it on. I do see people make that (usually implied) <i>assumption</i>, but as I said before, this assumption is no more than a reflection of their values[1].<p>&gt; These traits will cause them to be poor in any system which rewards hard work, intelligence and the creation of value for other people as a means of gaining income.<p>Only provided that the system doesn&#x27;t do other things, too (and why can&#x27;t the poor work hard? I think I work far less hard than a great many number of people far poorer than me).<p>----<p>[1]: As to values, I have absolutely no problem with people holding values that say &quot;every man to himself&quot;, and we shouldn&#x27;t go out of our ways to help the poor. I do see a <i>huge</i> problem with people offering social structures that try to curtail whatever power the poor do have, but not the power of the rich. The rich have their money and the poor have their numbers. They can use their numbers for violence or the threat of violence, to achieve better standing, or through a more sophisticated mechanism of democracy, where they impose restrictions on the rich. As a consequence, I see no ethical problem with either a social democracy or anarchy. But I see a big ethical problems with ideologies that prohibit violence, the threat of violence, and any form of organization imposing restrictions, while at the same time placing no restrictions on the use of power that comes from money. Those people are saying, &quot;every man to himself as long as we make sure no one with different sources of power than me can use their&#x27;s against me&quot;.