By David Riemer

These are the components of the work-based policy package that I designed to greatly increase employment and earnings, dramatically reduce poverty, and expand the middle-class:

1. A national Transitional Jobs program…like the New Deal’s Works Progress Administration (WPA)
2. A much higher federal minimum wage…roughly $17.50/hour
3. A restructured and bigger Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC)
4. Renewal of the expanded Child Tax Credit (CTC)
5. Free childcare
6. A higher SSI benefit set at 175% of the poverty line
7. A minimum Social Security benefit set at 190% of the poverty line

The choice of these policies is not random. In combination, they would dramatically reduce US poverty and greatly improve workers’ economic security.

A recent report* by the Urban Institute (UI) that analyzed this 7-part, work-based, policy package found that it would bring about large increases in employment and earnings, unprecedented reductions in poverty, and huge growth in the US middle class.

According to the UI Report, this policy package in 2018 would have:

• Increased US employment by nearly 7 million workers
• Raised US total earnings by over $300 billion
• Cut US poverty from a rate of 11.4% to 3.1%, a decrease of 73% or 27 million fewer poor people
• Shrunk US “near-poverty” (between 100%-150% of poverty) from a rate of 15.8% to 7.0%, a decrease of 56% or 28.5 million fewer “near-poor” persons
• Expanded the middle class (at/above 200% of poverty) from 59.3% to 75.0%, an increase of 26% or 51 million more middle-class individuals.

The following chart shows how dramatically the policy package would decrease poverty and shrink “near poverty,” while greatly expanding the middle class.

COMMENT: In a musical chairs economy (not enough jobs to go around) joblessness (both full and partial) is inevitable. Skill deficits, the job-seeking effort of jobless individuals, employment discrimination, family privilege, and other such factors determines who will suffer joblessness, but it is the size of the job gap and its geographic distribution that determines how much unemployment must be suffered and where it will be suffered. — Philip Harvey, Legislative Policy Advisor and Counsel, NJFAN

* Kevin Werner and Linda Gianarelli, “How a Work-Based Policy Package Can Reduce US Poverty,” The Urban Institute, August 2025

David Riemer, a member of the NJFAN’s Board of Directors and Chair of its Program Committee. Riemer is a Senior Fellow at the Community Advocates Public Policy Institute in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he led the effort to design a Work-based Policy package to ensure US workers economic security and enlarge America’s middle class that is featured in this issue of the NJFAN Newsletter.

During his career, Riemer played a major role in enacting Wisconsin’s Transitional Jobs program, supplemental Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), and its BadgerCare health insurance program.  Riemer directed the Wisconsin Health Project (2004-2007 and served as Wisconsin’s Budget Director (2003). From 1988-2001, he worked for Milwaukee Mayor Norquist as Budget Director, Administration Director, and Chief of Staff. Riemer previously served as legal advisor to Wisconsin Governor Patrick Lucey and counsel to Senator Edward Kennedy’s health subcommittee.

David Riemer is the author of The Prisoners of Welfare (Prager, 1988) and Putting Government In Its Place: The Case for a New Deal 3.0  (HenschelHAUS, 2019). He is a graduate of Harvard College (1970) and Harvard Law School (1975).