Data from the NLSY (National Longitudinal Survey of Youth) were analyzed to test two competing hypotheses regarding how poverty affects the relationship between delinquency and educational attainment. The cumulative disadvantage perspective argues that poor youth suffer greater consequences for their involvement in delinquency than middle and upper class youth in terms of their educational attainment. Contrary to this perspective, the disadvantage saturation thesis predicts that delinquency is less consequential for the educational attainment of poor youth than it is for non-poor youth. Results from OLS (ordinary least squares) and logistic regression analyses support the latter hypothesis. Delinquency, when defined in the context of school discipline, had a stronger detrimental effect on educational attainment for middle and upper class youth than it did for low-income adolescents. Theoretical and policy implications are discussed. (Contains 41 references.) (Author/SM)