The U.S. Census Bureau plans “a field test of the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) in calendar year 2027… in lieu of a national collection using the questionnaires, systems, and processes in place since 2014.” Public comments on the plans are due by October 6, 2026.
The Federal Register Notice explained that “Since 1983, SIPP has been the primary source of information about annual and sub-annual dynamics of income, families and households, movement into and out of government programs, and interactions of these topics in a single, unified dataset allowing for in-depth, informed analyses. Government domestic policy formulators and evaluators depend heavily upon the information collected in the SIPP in their analyses of the distribution of income received either directly as money or indirectly as in-kind benefits and the effect of tax and transfer programs on that distribution. They also rely on the SIPP data to provide improved and expanded information on the dynamics of income and the general economic and financial situation of the U.S. population in the context of the household situation. The SIPP has measured levels of economic well-being and permitted measurement of sub-annual and annual changes in these levels over time.”
SIPP traditionally “has been an interviewer-administered household-based survey. Each panel featured a nationally representative sample of addresses whose household members were interviewed either in person or over the phone several times over a multi-year period.”
However, the Bureau has recently “been researching new methods to mitigate concerns related to increasing costs for interviewer-administered surveys, declining response rates among sampled addresses, and increasing attrition of responding households in subsequent panels.”
The Census Bureau proposes to adopt “a self-administered internet survey as the primary mode for data collection with targeted in-person interviewing of a select number of non-responding households” as part of “a larger, bureau-wide effort to modernize data collection systems.” This will be part of “a multi-year testing strategy. In the summer of 2026, the Census Bureau is conducting an internet self-response field test using a subset of the redesigned SIPP instrument items on a national sample to assess the feasibility of a self-administered data collection (OMB number 0607-0978).”
The 2027 SIPP field test aims “to build upon the 2026 test by”:
- “adding content to the questionnaire”;
- “introducing a multi-mode survey that incorporates both self-response and non-response computer assisted personal interviewing (CAPI)”;
- “introducing alternative sample and weighting methodologies”; and
- “using the Census Bureau’s Business Ecosystem entities for all aspects of the survey process.”
The Bureau intends to:
- “use the test to evaluate the frame, sample, weighting, and non-response bias; to demonstrate the application of the new systems and processes to the SIPP design”;
- “research additional opportunities to reduce respondent burden through the use of administrative data systems”; and
- “to assess the quality of key estimates using the new methodologies.”
The SIPP field test is, the Bureau said, “purposefully scalable, as the future SIPP design is expected to be.”
Stakeholders may recall that The Census Project’s FY27 Funding Recommendation included SIPP: “In addition to restoring the $40 million cut to SIPP, The Census Project’s FY 2027 Funding Recommendation carries forward its FY 2026 request to provide SIPP with an additional $11.4 million, as endorsed by SIPP users, to restore the SIPP sample size and enable the Bureau to pursue other necessary innovations, such as improving the accuracy of month-by-month data and creating an Internet response option. In addition, our recommendation asks the Administration to be more specific and transparent about SIPP’s future and how its data will be collected and disseminated going forward.”
- Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposals, Submissions, and Approvals: Survey of Income and Program Participation https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/08/07/2026-16188/agency-information-collection-activities-submission-to-the-office-of-management-and-budget-omb-for
