Key Insights from Census Bureau’s 2023 Reports on US Income, Poverty, and Healthcare
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The Census Bureau has released three reports detailing income, poverty, and health insurance coverage in the United States for 2023, using the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) as an additional indicator of economic well-being. The data for these reports were sourced from the Current Population Survey (CPS), a monthly survey conducted by the Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, which provides labor force statistics and calculates the monthly unemployment rate. However, the response rate for the 2024 CPS survey saw a decrease from 68.9% in March 2023 to 67.2% in March 2024, which is significantly below the pre-pandemic levels of over 80%, potentially impacting the accuracy of the estimates.
Reports Reveal Poverty, Income, and Health Coverage Data in the US
New findings from three key reports by the Census Bureau have been released: Income in the United States: 2023, Poverty in the United States: 2023, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2023. These reports offer invaluable insights on the economic status of the country, based on money income, a pretax measure excluding tax credits.
The alternate poverty measure, the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), is also included. Providing a post-tax and transfer view, the SPM offers further economic insight. The SPM, a product of collaboration between the Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), has been published annually since 2011.
The concept of money income, consistent with past reports, is the basis for the income estimates in the “Income in the United States: 2023” report. The income report appendix provides post-tax median household income and income inequality metrics.
Data from the Current Population Survey (CPS ASEC), co-sponsored by the Census Bureau and BLS, forms the basis of these three reports. CPS, conducted monthly, provides principal labor force statistics for the U.S. population, including monthly unemployment rate estimates.
The 2024 ASEC, despite being collected through standard procedures, exhibits lower response rates compared to pre-pandemic periods, decreasing from 68.9% in March 2023 to 67.2% in March 2024. A study of how respondents differ from nonrespondents is crucial to ensure the accuracy of these reports since response rates remain below the standard 80%. The factors affecting income and official poverty estimates, including sample differences and nonresponse bias, are explored in the Research Matters blog, “Using Administrative Data to Evaluate Nonresponse Bias in the 2024 Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement.”
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