[Varyon]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

For an example of economic realism, societies where wizards are capable of generating high quality light for cheap will not hunt whales for lantern oil

Using whale oil lanterns may be considered a status symbol, or may be a cultural thing (it's not like the Japanese really need whale meat, but they keep hunting whales regardless). Alternatively, if theft of magic lanterns is common, it could actually be more economical to use whale oil instead in some areas (in The Stormlight Archives, certain gems can be charged with stormlight - essentially mana - and will produce light for some time, but as these gems are also used as currency and thus such lamps are targets of theft, in many poor areas oil is burned instead).

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

societies where anyone is capable of contributing to ceremonial magic should not have widespread poverty

I don't see this as a given, either. If there are more unskilled people available than are needed to work whatever magic is needed, there are going to be people who are not always employed. Also, some humans will refuse to work alongside some other humans (due to race, religion, age, behavior, appearance, smell, or whatever), and more than just "there aren't jobs available" can contribute to poverty (mental illness, drug use, etc). You could also have a setting where the pay for participating in magical rituals is below what's needed to stay above the poverty line, meaning while you can supplement your income by doing it, you (or someone else) need to make money elsewhere to avoid falling into poverty.

Certainly, in either case I'd expect whale hunting/poverty to be less common than historically, but in a setting with social/economic realism, I wouldn't expect them to be completely absent (although I wouldn't shoot down a setting where they are absent as outright unrealistic).