Riemer's talk can be summarized in his own words: ("As you know), last year, the Community Advocates Public Policy Institute released an analysis by the Urban Institute (UI) that showed how a combination of four policy changes, which we developed in consultation with a group of local and national experts, could cut poverty by more than half. Specifically, the UI analysis showed that the proposed four-part policy package 
would have reduced poverty in Wisconsin in 2008, using a more realistic Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), between 58% and 81%, depending on the rate of take-up of proposed transitional jobs and existing economic security programs like Food Stamps. The baseline SPM poverty rate was 8.0%. According to the UIs estimates, the policy package would have reduced the poverty rate to between 3.4% and 1.5%. The UI analysis focused on Wisconsin in 2008, and it assumed changes in federal policies. The nature of the policy package is such, however, that we believe that it would result in dramatically equal reductions in poverty in Pennsylvania, New York, or any stateas well as in the U.S. as a wholeand would do so regardless of whether the policy changes took place at the state or federal level."

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