You're right that regulation improved conditions of factory workers back in Victorian times. Since then? I'm not so sure. Regulation also brought in enforced trade union recognition and all the problems associated with that in the 1970s and subsequently. There are people unemployed today because of the Minimum Wage Act. There are small businesses struggling because of the bureaucratic demands of the state. There are companies who cannot invest because of high corporate taxation.
Re: the ability of people to lift themselves out of poverty but that's a different question.
Etc.