This is the statement that holds the clue to intergeneratinal poverty.  "Of the several causes of descent, there and elsewhere, into the intergenerational transmission of poverty.... Some causes of this remain unclear,".. Oh Really???  The presumption is that once no one was poor and then there was a "descent" into intergenerational poverty.  Instead of looking at the social, political, and economic history of those who suffer from generational poverty, Will compares them to "successful" middle and upper class.  Among "causes ...which remain unclear" would include, I assume, individuals for whom even a highschool diploma might be an intellectual struggle, through no fault of their own.  There was the Vietnam war from which many men did not recover; and a welfare system that for generations demanded there be no "man in the house." Asserting that knowing  which is the  proper spoon for soup as a cure for poverty illustrates the real poverty of the study.