The ‘poverty causes crime’ stance explicitly ignores the direction of causality. Perhaps it is that personally and socially destructive behavior (drug use, low education, teenage pregnancy, etc.) causes both crime and poverty for the individuals who exhibit those behaviors. Others may be poor for other reasons (such as those cited by the left that are intended to cover all poor people.) Thus, people can be poor and honest or poor and criminal. By assuming that all poor people are the same, and that all poverty is caused by something other than individual behaviors, the left is preventing us from addressing individuals with different behaviors according to their behaviors. Thus, the ‘poor and honest’ receive no societal benefit from their honesty, while the ‘poor and criminal’ receive no disadvantage from their criminality until they are caught and (maybe) punished.
