If you are intelligent and rich, there is no problem about getting the education you desire.
If you are poor but intelligent and have good grades, there are opportunities to higher education given by the government and private institutions.
But if you are poor and do not have good grades (there are many factors involved why many children do not do well in school), getting on to higher education would really be a problem.
If your educational record is not impressive, you would have a difficult time getting a good job. If you don’t have a good job, escaping from the cycle of poverty would be hard.