Children & Families in Poverty

This database contains the estimated number of persons and children ages 0-18, 0-4, and 5-17 in poverty as estimated by the Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates (SAIPE) Program, U.S. Bureau of the Census.  Estimates are not direct counts or from surveys but a result of modeling income and poverty estimates by combining survey data with population estimates and administrative records.  Lower and upper bounds around point estimates reported reflect 90th percentile confidence intervals.  Data are not available for all possible search combinations.

Poverty is based on money income thresholds that vary by family size and composition to determine who is in poverty. If a family's total income is less than the family's threshold, then that family and every individual in it is considered in poverty. The official poverty thresholds do not vary geographically, but they are updated for inflation using Consumer Price Index (CPI-U). The official poverty definition uses money income before taxes and does not include capital gains or noncash benefits (such as public housing, Medicaid, and food stamps).