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Example sentences do not suggest a big difference. Is there?

貧しい【まずしい】 poor  
貧乏【びんぼう】な poor

> [貧乏]{びんぼう}だけれど[彼]{かれ}は[幸福]{こうふく}だ。  
>  Poor as he is, he is happy.
>
> [貧]{まず}しいといえども[彼女]{かのじょ}は[幸]{しあわ}せだ。  
>  Though she is poor, she is happy.
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2019-06-05T16:34:48.660
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word-choice wago-and-kango
貧しい【まずしい】 poor 貧乏【びんぼう】な poor What's the difference?
They are same meaning! まずしい is old Japanese word. 貧乏 originates from China.
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2019-06-05T18:24:17.587
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貧乏 is more direct and less polite. For example, 貧乏人！ is an insult, but 貧しい人！
is not.

Similarly, referring to somebody as 貧乏 sounds less considerate than 貧しい. As an
example, あなたのお父上は貧乏だったのですか？ is odd because the rest of the sentence is very
polite (and thus can be taken as a passive aggressive slight).
あなたのお父上は貧しかったのですか？ is perfectly polite and will not be mistaken as an insult
(normally).
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2019-06-05T19:52:29.267
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貧乏 is a [Sino-Japanese word](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-
Japanese_vocabulary) (kango), and it only refers to _financial_ poorness. It's
an easy word, but it can sound somewhat direct and rude. In formal or academic
contexts, 貧困 ("poverty") is mainly used.

貧しい is a native Japanese word (wago), and it can refer to not only financial
poorness but also various kinds of poorness. For example you can say 心が貧しい人
("narrow-minded person"), 資源の貧しい国 ("resource-poor country"), 想像力が貧しい人 ("person
who lacks imagination skill") and so on. It's also a milder and safer word
when you need to say someone is financially poor. 彼は貧乏な家庭で育った and 彼は貧しい家庭で育った
are semantically the same, but the latter sounds "nicer" to me.

In general, Sino-Japanese words tend to have explicit, narrow or scientific
meanings, whereas native Japanese words tend to have some derivative,
idiomatic or figurative usages.

  * 血液 (kango for "blood") only refers to that red liquid. 血 (wago for "blood") also refers to "bloodline", "lineage", "human nature", etc.
  * 沸騰 (kango for "boil") only refers to physical boiling, whereas 沸く can also mean "to get hot enough" and "to get excited".
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In addition to the depth of the other answers, to depict the connotation:
(American English here)

貧しい： Poor, impoverished. You'd use it to describe a village.  
貧乏：Broke (financially, not broken). You'd use it to describe a person.
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