Official and Supplemental Poverty Measures, 3-year averages, New England and U.S., 2023-2025

On average, 7 to 9 percent of Vermonters lived in poverty between 2023 and 2025. This amounts to 46,000 to 57,000 people, including 9,000 to 11,000 children.

These numbers are based on recent data from the U.S. Census, which measures poverty in two ways: the Official Poverty Measure (OPM) and the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM). The OPM compares pretax income to a national poverty threshold adjusted annually for inflation and varying by family size and members’ ages. The SPM—generally considered more accurate—factors in government supports plus childcare, taxes, local housing and other expenses, and compares the results to a threshold based on costs from five years of recent consumer expenditure surveys.