The Current Population Survey (CPS), sponsored jointly by the U.S. Census Bureau and U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, is the primary source of labor force statistics for the United States. It provides numerous high-profile economic statistics, including the national unemployment rate and data on a wide range of issues relating to employment and earnings.

Although the main purpose of the CPS is to collect information on employment and the labor market, a very important secondary purpose is to collect data on the demographic characteristics  of the population, including age, sex, race, marital status, educational attainment, family structure, income, earnings, and poverty.

The CPS is based upon a monthly sample survey of about 60,000 occupied households. Each household is interviewed once a month for four consecutive months one year and again during the same months the following year. This technique enables the Census Bureau to obtain month-to-month and year-to-year comparisons at a reasonable cost while minimizing the inconvenience to any one household.

The CPS is conducted using a combination of telephone and in-person interviews with household respondents. The CPS has a much smaller sample than does the ACS. However, it has the advantages of more personalized enumerator-conducted questioning and, as a result, more detailed responses, especially on matters of income and poverty.

Periodic supplements to the basic monthly survey collect data on special topics such as worker displacement, employee tenure, and military veterans with service-connected disabilities. These data, generally collected during a one-month period, are used to produce an annual estimate. One such supplement is the Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC) to the CPS. Data collection for the CPS ASEC occurs every year, mostly in March.

The CPS ASEC includes data from the general CPS, as well as more detailed questions on topics pertaining to international migration and foreign-born populations, including place of birth, parental place of birth, citizenship status, and year of entry into the United States. In addition, the CPS ASEC asks the same detailed questions the general CPS does about the U.S. labor force, employment, income, earnings, and poverty.

For more information about the CPS ASEC, please visit the following pages:

• CPS ASEC technical documentation, data dictionaries, data files, and instructions.
• Subject definitions
• Questionnaires
• Methodology
• Data
• Publications and visualizations

MDAT (MicroData Access Tool) is an online tool for extracting Census Bureau public use data according to your specifications. It has data from the ACS, Current Population Survey (CPS), Decennial Census of Population and Housing, and other sources.

For guidance on how to use MDAT, refer to the Getting Started and How-to materials on the MDAT website. For video tutorials on how to create ACS custom tables or CPS ASEC poverty estimates using MDAT, click on the links below.

Part 1: ACS Custom Tables

Part 2: CPS ASEC Poverty Estimates  

To learn more about the Foreign Born topic, including definitions of terms, click here.