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The instructor said that the sentence below contains a subordinate clause ("... if only for financial reasons."), but I feel that what is being called a 'subordinate clause,' is just a phrase, as there is no verb. Can the verb be assumed and unstated? Or is the instructor wrong?
Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons.
You can interpolate the verb:
Money is better than poverty, [even] if [it is so] only for financial reasons.
I think it's a subordinate clause with those words elided, because "if" is a conjunction.
If it said
Money is better than poverty for financial reasons.
then "for financial reasons" would be only a preposition phrase acting as an adverb.
