Mattt, your position is logical, but I feel ignores a few important factors.
Firstly, I don't see any meaningful desire to educate the poor. Wealth is relative, it is not in the interest of those at the top (and those riding their coattails) for the lower echelons to become financially saavy. Yes, anyone can learn these things, but if it's not a part of your inherited cultural knowledge you are unlikely to realise how severe that gap in your knowledge is, let alone know how to go about fixing it. That does not make a person stupid.
Secondly, the markets one has access to are not equal, and the punishments for manipulating them, or breaking the law, are not proportionate to the social harm done. Consider the difference between selling weed and selling a mortgage to a family that you know is likely to end in foreclosure. Financial services available to different income brackets are hardly proportionate either.
Thirdly, some people have no desire to become financially successful, they don't want to play the game. Whether that's because of apathy and alienation, or political opposition. As there is no opting-out of society, they turn up in the stats as "failures".
Lastly, the social role of payed advocate has been twisted beyond recognition. It is now seemingly acceptable for a service provider to do all it can to decieve customers, as long as it is within the law. Whilst this may make some kind of economic sense, I feel it is a sad state of affairs. There will always be an element of this in a trade-based economy, but the fact that dishonesty is not only accepted but expected now... well it's both sad and bizarre.
Yes, you have to learn to play the game to stay afloat in this dog-eat-dog world. But how many people enjoy, or benefit from, this game?