I haven't been poor myself, but I'll offer some weak evidence in favor of a weakened version of your thesis.
I've seen a fair number of people say that when they were children, they were poor but didn't know it, and they were happy. This suggests that (presumably above some level of destitution), low relative status affects people more than absolute wealth. I can't remember whether being poor but happy as a child is correlated with living in the country, but this wouldn't surprise me. It may also be true that children are better at being happy than adults, and this could be worth some study.
This thread is intended to provide a space for 'crazy' ideas. Ideas that spontaneously come to mind (and feel great), ideas you long wanted to tell but never found the place and time for and also for ideas you think should be obvious and simple - but nobody ever mentions them.
This thread itself is such an idea. Or rather the tangent of such an idea which I post below as a seed for this thread.
Rules for this thread:
If this should become a regular thread I suggest the following :