American Community Survey, United States (ICPSR 38043)
Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s)
United States Census Bureau
This is an external resource to which ICPSR links as a courtesy. These data are not available from ICPSR. Users should consult the data owners (via American Community Survey, United States) directly for details on obtaining these resources.
Summary View help for Summary
The American Community Survey (ACS) Summary File is a set of comma-delimited text files that contain all of the Detailed Tables for the ACS data releases. Summary File estimates, margins of error, and geography files for each release are available.
The Detailed Tables are stored in a series of files with only the data from the tables and without such information as the table title, description of the rows, or geographic identifiers. That information is located in other files that the user must merge with the data files to reproduce full tables. Starting with the 2009-2013 ACS 5-year data release, block groups, the lowest level of geography published by the ACS, are available at data.census.gov. For earlier years, block groups are available only in the ACS 5-year Summary File.
Funding View help for Funding
Subject Terms View help for Subject Terms
Geographic Coverage View help for Geographic Coverage
HideStudy Purpose View help for Study Purpose
The American Community Survey (ACS) helps local officials, community leaders, and businesses understand the changes taking place in their communities. It is the premier source for detailed population and housing information about our nation.
Study Design View help for Study Design
The American Community Survey (ACS) is a relatively new survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau. It uses a series of monthly samples to produce annually updated estimates for the same small areas (census tracts and block groups) formerly surveyed via the decennial census long-form sample.
Sample View help for Sample
Initially, five years of samples were required to produce these small-area data. Once the Census Bureau, released its first 5-year estimates in December 2010; new small-area statistics now are produced annually. The Census Bureau also will produce 3-year and 1-year data products for larger geographic areas. The ACS includes people living in both housing units (HUs) and group quarters (GQs). The ACS is conducted throughout the United States and in Puerto Rico, where it is called the Puerto Rico Community Survey (PRCS). For ease of discussion, the term ACS is used here to represent both surveys.