Three Simple Rules Poor Teens Should Follow to Join the Middle Class (2013)
brookings.edu
brookings.edu
- finish high school - get a full-time job - wait until age 21 to get married and have children.
"Our research shows that of American adults who followed these three simple rules, only about 2 percent are in poverty and nearly 75 percent have joined the middle class (defined as earning around $55,000 or more per year). There are surely influences other than these principles at play, but following them guides a young adult away from poverty and toward the middle class."
Full-time employment increasingly requires a college education, which not only requires high school, but is increasingly expensive as well. I've known several promising people who, rather than undertake loans, simply dropped out and took a few part-time jobs to help their families with immediate needs.
Not to say that the rules can't be followed or don't help, but poverty is a trap and it's not correct to invert these rules - that is, to say "you're struggling so clearly you didn't do the right things" is wrong.
Brookings also followed this up with a report entitled "Following the success sequence? Success is more likely if you’re white."[1]
Note that I don't mean to make any claims as to OP's political outlook or motives in sharing this article.
[0] https://youtu.be/aDMjgOYOcDw?t=594
[1] https://www.brookings.edu/research/following-the-success-seq...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brookings_Institution
My own political outlook is largely libertarian but with a predilection for voting for whatever local politician brings the Tour de France within spitting distance of my apartment. ;)
As someone in his sixties, however, I would like to add that as much as we would like to believe in nurture over nature, it does seem that the biggest difference between those who thrive and those who don't is that some seem to lack the drive, the initiative to make things happen in their lives. If it is in your personality to be ambitious and optimistic, probably nothing can hold you back. For people with naturally passive personalities, you had better have been born with lots of external support.
Life isn't fair, but as a conservative I am not in favor of enforcing equal outcomes for everyone. But just about everybody who "made it" in their chosen life's work can think of several people who reached out to give them a chance. Be that person if you can.