I will say this much – I don’t think race plays more than a superfluous role. The actual problem is probably poverty. I don’t mean by poverty simply lacking funds but the myriad of socio-economic factors – very often complicated by various dysfunctions (here I would include your education theory as well as lack of job holding skills, lack of job skills, drug and alcohol abuse, depression, et al) – which serve to maintain the status quo. I am also not including the transitory poor (those who fall into poverty for whatever reason but then move back into a higher income bracket) but rather endemic poverty.

Race, in my opinion, relates mostly from the proportions of impoverished minorities but the fact that so many are not endemically impoverished (or do not remain so) argues against race as a determining factor. Culture, not race, is probably the stronger influence maintaining endemic poverty (economic variations don’t seem to affect the endemic populations very much if at all as evidenced by the small variation in welfare figures when allowing for transitory poverty* which points more to culture than race). Those factors that lend themselves to maintaining endemic poverty (here I would, controversially, I know, include welfare itself as presently administered) probably also lend themselves to poor financial management (note that poverty is not necessarily an indicator of poor financial management skills – and there will be some that manage a budget well but have little skill beyond that) hence the disparity in credit / debt problems.

*based on personal observation and not a recent research of actual figures. I believe the point valid but will concede that I could be proven wrong.