Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2023

These findings come from three Census Bureau reports: Income in the United States: 2023; Poverty in the United States: 2023; and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2023. While the official poverty measure is based on the concept of money income, which is pretax and does not include tax credits, the SPM is a post-tax and transfer poverty measure. The SPM provides an alternative way of measuring poverty in the United States and serves as an additional indicator of economic well-being. The Census Bureau has published poverty estimates using the SPM annually since 2011 in collaboration with the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

For consistency with past reports, the income estimates in the "Income in the United States: 2023" report are based on the concept of money income. Appendix B of the income report provides post-tax estimates of median household income and income inequality metrics.

All three reports are based on data from the CPS ASEC. The Current Population Survey (CPS), sponsored jointly by the Census Bureau and BLS, is conducted every month and is the primary source of labor force statistics for the U.S. population. It is used to calculate monthly unemployment rate estimates. Supplements are added in most months. The CPS ASEC - conducted in February, March and April - is designed to provide annual, national estimates of income, poverty and health insurance estimates, collecting information about job status, income and health insurance coverage during the prior calendar year.

Although the 2024 ASEC was collected using standard procedures, response rates are still lower than they were before the pandemic. The response rate for the CPS basic household survey declined from 68.9% in March 2023 to 67.2% in March 2024.

Since the response rates remain below pre-pandemic levels, which were regularly above 80%, it is important to examine how respondents differ from nonrespondents, as this difference could affect the accuracy of the estimates. For more details on how sample difference and the associated nonresponse bias impact income and official poverty estimates, refer to the Research Matters blog, "Using Administrative Data to Evaluate Nonresponse Bias in the 2024 Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement."