Hello John,
Again wealth and poverty is part of this test. Whether we have wealth or we are poor, We are not excused from doing our duties such as prayer and fasting Ramadan.
Are these Muslims exempt from his Islamic duties such as Salat and Ramadan
No,why should they?we are in a test and this is their test.
Salah is not big only to those who are weak/hypocrites.
"Seek help with steadfastness and prayer– though this is hard indeed for anyone but the humble," Al baqarah verse 45
Did you know?
Abu Hurairah (May Allah be pleased with him) reported: Messenger of Allah (PBUH) said, "The poor will enter Jannah five hundred years before the rich.''
[At-Tirmidhi].
Commentary: Al-Fuqara' (the poor) means those Fuqara' who are perfect in Faith. Such people will go to Jannah five hundered years before the rich because the latter will have to account for their wealth, from where they had got it and how they had spent it, while the former will not be answerable for any such thing.
From an outside perspective, this looks extremely unfair, as they could potentially end up in a higher level of paradise and in some case the poorer Muslims never going to paradise at all as they may not have exercised their obligatory Islamic duties.
In Al sajdah verse 21:
وَلَنُذِيقَنَّهُم مِّنَ الْعَذَابِ الْأَدْنَىٰ دُونَ الْعَذَابِ الْأَكْبَرِ- لَعَلَّهُمْ يَرْ-جِعُونَ
(And We will certainly make them taste the nearer punishment before the greater punishment, so that they may return),
the word: أَدْنَىٰ (adna) has been used in the sense of 'nearer' and الْعَذَابِ الْأَدْنَىٰ (al adhab-ul-adna) denotes diseases, sufferings and calamities of the world that are made to befall a lot of people by Allah Ta'ala in order to warn them against their sins.