"Poverty" and "wealth" have both been part of the human experience forever. Some people are born with two strikes against them, while others seem to be blessed with luck. If a person doesn't avail themselves of the opportunities presented to them, they will probably Never achieve much in life. Good jobs, with decent wages, will continue to be increasingly hard to find, as technology and automation continue to take over tasks which once made the Middle Class the mainstay of society. That, coupled with runaway population growth, means that there will be more and more people competing for fewer available jobs....which is going to also suppress wages.
On the other hand....there are millions of jobs available Today, that are going unfulfilled....primarily because there is a shortage of people with the needed skills to fill those jobs. Many are in the areas of manufacturing and the "trades", which pay good wages, but there are not enough people will the skills to fill these jobs. This continues to be one of the reasons why so much of our manufacturing keeps going overseas. Some of the blame can be placed upon our education system which no longer prepares the students for any kind of manual labor....it seems that everyone Must have a college degree, even though half those degrees are in studies that are of little practical value. Then, too, our schools have been forced to become "politically correct", and the teachers must teach to the lowest level in the classroom, which leaves the brighter students with little to challenge their intellect.
Sooo...Ben Carson is only partially correct. Poverty is often due to a "state of mind" that creates an unwillingness to work hard and achieve something....but, poverty is going to become an increasing problem as fewer opportunities are presented for people to achieve success.
