The Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) is a rotating panel survey, with a new panel begun each year. Each person in the SIPP sample is interviewed at four month intervals for 2-l/2 years. A general introduction to the SIPP is found in Nelson, McMillen, and Kasprzyk (1985). This paper describes the design features, survey content, and operational procedures, and is available through the Population Division o f the Census Bureau.

The SIPP program has been an agenda item for Census Bureau Advisory Committees several times during the last four years, the last being in April 1986. The paper prepared for presentation before the Census Advisory Committee o f the American Statistical Association and the Census Advisory Committee on Population Statistics provided an overall program review at the time and is available from the Population Division (Kasprzyk and Herriot, 1986). This update to the program activities will cover:

1. data collection;

2. changes to core data: 1988 Panel;

3. analysis and products at the Census Bureau;

4. activities related to users needs;

5. liaison with the research community;

6. research and evaluation sponsored by the Census Bureau;

7. research and evaluation within the Census Bureau; and

8. other projects.