Whenever something seems off like that I usually try to follow the money to see who profits from it. In this case, I’m partial to the explanation that it stems back to business opposition to the New Deal pushing a lot of money into promoting libertarian Christianity, with one of the bedrock principles being that the world is just and therefore someone rich must have deserved it in some way.

Kevin Kruse wrote a book about that a few years ago and anyone familiar with American politics or religion will recognize a lot of the people involved:

http://kevinmkruse.com/book/one-nation-under-god/