National Experimental Well-Being Statistics Project (NEWS)

The NEWS project aims to produce the best possible estimates of income and poverty given all available survey, decennial census, administrative, and third-party data. We estimate improved income and poverty statistics by addressing bias from unit non-response, missing information and measurement error.

We have statistics on income and poverty for 2016-2021 with interactive figures, including:

  • Income
    • Money Income - By Year | By Subgroup
      • income received on a regular basis (exclusive of certain money receipts such as capital gains) before payments for personal income taxes, Social Security, union dues, Medicare deductions, etc.
    • Disposable Income - By Year | By Subgroup
      • money income minus taxes plus tax credits, for both state and federal taxes and credits.
    • Disposable Income + In-Kind Benefits - By Year | By Subgroup
      • money income minus taxes plus tax credits, for both state and federal taxes and credits plus the value of noncash benefits.
  • Poverty

    • Official Poverty Measure (OPM) - By Year | By Subgroup
      • poverty based on money income at the family level, so it does not include taxes, credits, or noncash benefits.
    • Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) - By Year | By Subgroup
      • poverty based on money income and noncash benefits from government programs aimed at low-income families and minus taxes and necessary expenses.

Overall, we find that standard survey-based income and poverty estimates are biased, and these biases vary by subgroup and over time. This can cause estimates to miss important facts about how economic well-being is changing over time and why. For example, the NEWS and survey estimate of SPM child poverty differ over time due to changes in survey nonresponse bias and sources of income, particularly with the large expansion of unemployment insurance during the pandemic. Child poverty was 1.5pp lower in NEWS than the survey in 2018, they were not statistically different in 2019 or 2021, and the NEWS estimate was 3.8pp lower than the survey in 2020.

More details from the release are available from the release website, including: