Poverty Guidelines

Poverty guidelines differ slightly from poverty thresholds. The guidelines are a simplification of the poverty thresholds for administrative purposes such as determining the financial eligibility for certain federal programs. The Department of Health and Human Services issues poverty guidelines each year in the Federal Register. Poverty guidelines are designated by the year that they are issued.


For instance, the guidelines issued generally in the beginning of 1999 are designated the 1999 poverty guidelines, but reflect only the price changes through the 1998 calendar year; they are approximately equal to the Census Bureau poverty thresholds for the 1998 calendar year.


Programs and policies that use poverty guidelines to determine eligibility include Head Start, the National School Lunch Program, the Food Stamp Program, the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, the Oregon Health Plan, and the Oregon Working Families Child Care Credit.


These guidelines are used for many, but not all, federal, state, and local poverty programs. The Federal Earned Income Tax Credit is one example that does not use the poverty guidelines. Public Housing programs, such as Section 8, uses the area median income to determine eligibility.
Poverty guidelines are often commonly called the "federal poverty level," or "federal poverty line."