Food Security in the United States:
Current Population Survey Food Security Supplement (CPS-FSS)

Overview

The Current Population Survey Food Security Supplement (CPS-FSS) is the source of national and State-level statistics on food insecurity used in USDA's annual reports on household food security. The CPS is a monthly labor force survey of about 50,000 households conducted by the Census Bureau for the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Once each year, after answering the labor force questions, the same households are asked a series of questions (the Food Security Supplement) about food security, food expenditures, and use of food and nutrition assistance programs. Food security data have been collected by the CPS-FSS each year since 1995.

Data Files

Public-use household-level CPS-FSS data files are available for each year, beginning in 1995. The DataFerrett system at the U.S. Census Bureau may be used to download data or to carry out tabulations on-line. Alternatively, these data may be purchased from the U.S. Census Bureau on CD-ROM by calling the Customer Service Center at (301) 763-4636. Four data sets that complement those available from the Census are available here on the ERS website:

1) CPS 1995 Revised Food Security Status data—This file provides household food security scores and food security status categories that are consistent with procedures and variable naming conventions introduced in 1996. This includes the "common screen" variables to facilitate comparisons of prevalence rates across years. This file must be matched to the 1995 CPS Food Security Supplement public-use data file.

• Download the data in uncompressed fixed ASCII or zipped format.
• See the Food Security Supplement: Current Population Survey April 1995 microdata technical documentation.
• Access the SAS code and data dictionary to read in the raw data after download.

2) CPS 1998 Children's and 30-day Food Security data—Subsequent to the release of the April 1999 CPS-FSS public-use data file, USDA developed two additional food security scales to describe aspects of food security conditions in interviewed households not captured by the 12-month household food security scale. This file provides three food security variables (categorical, raw score, and scale score) for each of these scales along with household identification variables to allow the user to match this supplementary data file to the CPS-FSS April 1998 data file.

• Download the data in uncompressed fixed ASCII or zipped format.
• See the CPS 1998 Children's and 30-day Food Security Data File technical documentation.
• Access the data dictionary and SAS code to read in the raw data after download.

3) CPS 1999 Children's and 30-day Food Security data—Subsequent to the release of the April 1999 CPS-FSS public-use data file, USDA developed two additional food security scales to describe aspects of food security conditions in interviewed households not captured by the 12-month household food security scale. This file provides three food security variables (categorical, raw score, and scale score) for each of these scales along with household identification variables to allow the user to match this supplementary data file to the CPS-FSS April 1999 data file.

• Download the data in uncompressed fixed ASCII or zipped format.
• See the CPS 1999 Children's and 30-day Food Security Data File technical documentation.
• Access the data dictionary and SAS code to read in the raw data after download.

4) CPS 2000 30-day Food Security data—Subsequent to the release of the September 2000 CPS-FSS public-use data file, USDA developed a revised 30-day CPS Food Security Scale. This file provides three food security variables (categorical, raw score, and scale score) for the 30-day scale along with household identification variables to allow the user to match this supplementary data file to the CPS-FSS September 2000 data file.

• Download the data in uncompressed fixed ASCII or zipped format.
• See the CPS 2000 Children's and 30-day Food Security Data File technical documentation.
• Access the data dictionary and SAS code to read in the raw data after download.

Note that all downloaded files, either from the Census Bureau or the ERS website, are large raw data files—one record per interviewed household or person—not tables of statistics. Knowledge of the subject matter, survey methods, survey data format, and data analysis is required to use the files. For statistical summaries and technical reports that are based on these data, see the recommended readings of the Food Security in the United States Briefing Room. The technical documentation and user notes section below will facilitate the appropriate use of the data for each of the years.

Instructions

Technical documentation/user notes and questionnaires are available for each file of the CPS-FSS. The notes and questionnaires are not identical across years.

Media

Data files are available through the web-based DataFerrett system of the U.S. Census Bureau, or on CD-ROM from the U.S. Census Bureau in ASCII format. Files on the ERS website are available as ASCII uncompressed or zipped.

Release Dates

Data are released approximately one year after the survey is completed (currently in early December) following quality assurance checks by the Census Bureau and ERS.

Related Resources

Information and links to other national surveys that collect food security data can be found through the Food Security in the United States data page.