I agree with you, @meno. A system or country does not have to turn socialist or communist to be fair and provide its people with decent living conditions, which I'm sure would encourage them to work even harder to keep those living conditions and even improve them even further.
What socialism and communism add to the equation is repression and forced ideology where far from eliminating poverty they need to keep it and increase it.
Only the destitute would rely on the state to support them since on their own they would be unable to climb up the social ladder (once the state has extended its tentacles across every economic, social, and cultural activity).
I think that regardless of the political system that rules (democracy, monarchy, communism, dictatorship), it is human ambitions and follies what ends up imposing themselves over the wellbeing of the masses.
Leaders wrongly believe that they need to empoverish to control, and the empoverished masses wrongly believe they can't do anything about it.
it's a toxic symbiosis!