Neglect and abuse are considered to be the result of such decisions, while poverty is considered to be (often? always?) the result of bad luck.
The bigger difference is that neglect and abuse are carried out after children are born, while poverty is usually there before they are born. Prospecitve parents are much likelier to correctly predict they’ll be bringing up poor children, than that they’ll be bringing up neglected or abused children. And for the same reason, it’s much easier for society to predict who’ll be a poor parent, and disincentivize them, than it is to predict who’ll be a bad parent.
So if people really carried about bad decisions vs. bad luck, they would blame poor parents for deciding to have predictably poor children. Instead people seem to reason that both poor and rich people have a right to raise children, which mostly overrides the desire of those children to not have poor parents.
The bigger difference is that neglect and abuse are carried out after children are born, while poverty is usually there before they are born. Prospecitve parents are much likelier to correctly predict they’ll be bringing up poor children, than that they’ll be bringing up neglected or abused children. And for the same reason, it’s much easier for society to predict who’ll be a poor parent, and disincentivize them, than it is to predict who’ll be a bad parent.
So if people really carried about bad decisions vs. bad luck, they would blame poor parents for deciding to have predictably poor children. Instead people seem to reason that both poor and rich people have a right to raise children, which mostly overrides the desire of those children to not have poor parents.