This paper will evaluate the effect of changes to the Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC) on estimates of the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), (Short, 2014) and examine if those changes bring about similar results as seen in earlier studies. Most important will be the effect of changes to questions about retirement income and medical out-of-pocket expenses (MOOP).

The percent of the population that was poor using the official measure for 2013 was 14.5 percent. The research SPM rate was 15.5 percent. For most groups, SPM rates are higher than official poverty rates. Lower poverty rates were found for children, individuals included in new SPM resource units, Blacks, those living outside metropolitan areas, renters, those covered by only public health insurance, and individuals with a disability. An important finding was that SPM rates for those over 64 years of age were higher under the SPM, 9.5 percent using the official measure compared to 14.6 using the SPM. This partially reflects that the official thresholds are set lower for families with householders in this age group, while the SPM thresholds do not vary by age. It also reflects large medical out-of-pocket expenses (MOOP) reported by those over the age of 64, a necessary expense that is subtracted from income in the SPM calculation. In addition, many have suggested that the ASEC does not collect information on retirement income well (Bee, 2013, Anguelov et al., 2012 ).