An official website of the United States government
Here’s how you know
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock (
) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.
This paper provides Health Inclusive Poverty Measure (HIPM) estimates from 2014 to 2021. The estimates reflect adaptations to the original methodology (Korenman and Remler 2016) to meet the U.S Census Bureau’s annual production timelines and include information from internal data (Creamer 2021). HIPM expands the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) by incorporating health insurance values in poverty measurement. The HIPM poverty rate in 2021 was 9.5 percent, 1.7 percentage points higher than the SPM poverty rate of 7.8 percent, and 2.1 percentage points lower than the official poverty rate of 11.6 percent. This represents a decline in HIPM rates of 7.4 percentage points since 2014, not statistically different from the SPM, which declined 7.8 percentage points in the same period. In 2021, differences between HIPM and SPM were notable for Hispanic individuals and non-citizens, reflecting higher uninsured rates for these groups. The impact of public assistance is considered too, with Medicare and Medicaid having a 5.8 and 4.2 percentage point impact on overall HIPM rates respectively. Sensitivity tests are performed to determine the impact of methodological changes compared to previous estimates. Overall, the estimates provide supportive evidence that HIPM could be produced under the current U.S. Census Bureau production timelines and highlight the key differences between poverty measures.
Share
Related Information
WORKING PAPER
Health Insurance Working PapersTop