It probably comes from America's largely Puritan upbringing. We have this intrinsic belief that how successful (in terms of power, money, respect, fame) you are

It probably comes from America's largely Puritan upbringing. We have this intrinsic belief that how successful (in terms of power, money, respect, fame) you are is a reflection of how good a person you are, and if you are a bad person then you will get what's coming to you. And that these traits are basically innate, so someone who's bad is irredeemable, so we should minimize the harm they do to the good people, while if someone was good they wouldn't be in whatever bad situation they're in, or at the very least they would have already figured out how to get themselves out of it. This is reflected in our means-testing for entitlements, for instance: if you can't find a job within a few months, you must be intrinsically lazy, and therefore don't deserve anymore handouts. So we cut off unemployment and food aid after a relatively short amount of time.