A couple of years ago I visited a castle in Slovakia. The boss of the castle had all sorts of amenities (the museum told), such as people who washed their clothes, food that would appear magically, heated rooms. That required a whole castle with lots of employees (slaves?) to sustain. These days "normal" people live better than the kings in former times, with zero employees, thanks to technology. So poor is not always the same as poor.
Also, please provide an example of startups catering to rich people? Tesla comes to mind, but other than that? Netflix is pretty cheap, I think - certainly cheaper than the cable subscriptions of old times?
The article isn't talking about the relative wealth of modern, industrialized/technologized society to medieval times.
The point is that a single mom (with an 80% chance of being "poor or hovering on the nasty edges of working poverty") probably isn't worried about how much Netflix, or rather cable TV, costs when she can't afford someone to watch her child so she can go to work and make money to pay for food and a roof over her head. She isn't going to pull out her iPhone and call an Uber to drive her to work from this place she AirBnB'd last night -- adding it to her Snapchat story, of course, before she heads out the door.
Is that really the case? I think some citation would be nice. For example the refugees in Europe often have a smartphone among the very few things they take along on their journey, simply because is is essential to their survival. I mean they have nothing, but they have a smartphone. And some smartphones have become really cheap, too - (there is Android, you don't have to buy an iPhone).
Also, please provide an example of startups catering to rich people? Tesla comes to mind, but other than that? Netflix is pretty cheap, I think - certainly cheaper than the cable subscriptions of old times?