Politicians on both sides of the aisle point to breaking the cycle of poverty as one of the most vital issues facing the country. But what the politicians can’t agree on is how to do it.
Lowering taxes, increasing entitlements – many ideas are floated on a state and federal level, but still, around 45 million people live in poverty.
"We need to try something new to get the poverty rate down below ten percent, down below seven percent. We know that it can be done - we did it in the past. The question then is what would it take to drive poverty from 10, 11, 12, 15 percent down to six, seven percent," David Riemer says. He's a senior fellow with the Community Advocate's Public Policy Institute.
The institute recently released the Working Our Way Out of Poverty report, which looks at what it would take to cut the country’s poverty rate in half. Much of it is centered on employment.
Riemer; Julie Kerksick, senior policy advocate for the Working Our Way Out of Poverty Project; and Conor Williams, policy analyst for the project, joined Lake Effect's Mitch Teich to discuss the report:
