Survey of Financial Security (SFS)

Low-income status of person, level

Low-income status refers to the income situation of the statistical unit in relation to a specific low-income line in a reference year. Statistical units with income that is below the low-income line are considered to be in low income.

Person refers to an individual and is the unit of analysis for most social statistics programs.

The data for this variable are reported using the following measurements:

• 'Low-income measure, after-tax (LIM-AT)' refers to a fixed percentage (50%) of median adjusted after-tax income of private households. The household after-tax income is adjusted by an equivalence scale to take economies of scale into account. This adjustment for different household sizes reflects the fact that a household's needs increase, but at a decreasing rate, as the number of members increases.