Currently, Islam is typically (though not always) more ripe for converts in places of hopelessness and poverty.

It's similar to communism during the Cold War. The most susceptible nations to fall to communism were those in dire economic straits, whose people (those with jobs) earned pennies a day, and where poverty and hopelessness were rife.

Many of the converts to Islam today in the U.S. are Black Americans in jail.

Typically, religion appeals to the more downtrodden, disempowered, disaffected people in society. And the more downtrodden, disempowered, disaffected, the more appealing a RIGID form of religion is.

It's the same the world over; even in the U.S. The poorest part of the U.S. is the South. Where are most of the Evangelicals and fundamentalists? The South.

Nothing new under the Sun.