Improvements to the Census Bureau’s Supplemental Poverty Measure

The Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) is one of two measures of poverty produced by the Census Bureau (the other measure being the official poverty measure). The SPM has been published by the Census Bureau since 2011 and expands the money income definition of poverty used by the official poverty measure to include noncash resources and subtract necessary expenses such as taxes and medical expenses. In 2021, 10 years since the first publication of the SPM, the SPM methodology was updated based on recommendations from an interagency technical working group (Burns and Fox, 2021). Updates were made to both SPM thresholds and resources. In 2020, the Census Bureau commissioned the National Academies of Science Committee on National Statistics (CNSTAT) to convene an expert consensus panel to evaluate the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) and recommend improvements to the measure. The report was released in Spring of 2023 (Ziliak et al., 2023). It included recommendations for changes in the way housing, childcare, and healthcare needs are measured and incorporated into poverty measurement. 

Overview

Research on Healthcare

Research on Childcare

Research on Housing

Other Research

Prior Research on Updates to the Supplemental Poverty Measure

2021 SPM Improvements

Page Last Revised - November 18, 2024