How much did the 2026 guidelines increase or decrease percentage-wise from 2025 by household size?
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Executive summary
The federal poverty guidelines used for 2026 marketplace eligibility are the 2025 HHS poverty guidelines; those 2025 guidelines reflect a 2.9% inflation adjustment from the prior update and list specific annual dollar amounts by household size (the 2025 figures are used for coverage year 2026) [1][2]. Available sources do not provide a single consolidated table that computes the percentage change from 2025 to 2026 by household size; they instead show that 2026 eligibility and applicable percentages for subsidies use the 2025 poverty levels and that per‑person add‑ons for households over eight vary by source (commonly $5,500 or $6,880 depending on context) [2][3][4].
1. What “2026 guidelines” means and why they are the 2025 HHS figures
The marketplace subsidy and many program eligibilities for coverage year 2026 rely on the HHS poverty guidelines published in 2025; the Federal Register says the 2025 guidelines were produced by increasing Census poverty thresholds by the CPI‑U change (2.9%) and then rounding/standardizing the series [1]. Several aggregator and guidance sites reiterate that coverage‑year 2026 eligibility is based on the 2025 poverty levels rather than a newly published 2026 table [2][4].
2. What the official update actually changed: the 2.9% inflation adjustment
The Federal Register notice states the 2025 update reflects a 2.9% price increase between 2023 and 2024 and explains that rounding/standardizing can create small anomalies, including rare cases where a household size’s guideline may not strictly rise if the formula produces that result [1]. That 2.9% is the primary numeric change cited in the official update [1].
3. Why I can’t give a clean “percent change by household size” table from 2025→2026
Available sources do not publish a separate 2026 HHS poverty table to compare against 2025 line‑by‑line; instead, guidance says 2026 subsidy rules use the 2025 guidelines and that the 2025 Federal Register adjustment was the 2.9% CPI‑U‑based increase [1][2]. Because there is no distinct 2026 guideline table in the provided results, I cannot compute or cite percent increases by household size between 2025 and 2026; that specific comparison is not found in current reporting (not found in current reporting).
4. Conflicting or varying per‑person add‑ons above eight persons
Multiple guidance documents and calculators reference different incremental amounts for households larger than eight: some sources say add $6,880 per additional person for the 2025 poverty base used for coverage year 2026 in certain contexts (often Alaska or older citations), while others and IRS/marketplace references use roughly $5,500 (or $5,380 in one citation) per extra person for contiguous U.S. guidance—this inconsistency appears across secondary sources [2][3][4]. That divergence matters for anyone trying to compute exact dollar levels for very large households and demonstrates the need to check the primary HHS/ASPE tables for the specific jurisdiction [2][4].
5. Practical implications for subsidy and program eligibility
Because market‑year 2026 subsidies reference 2025 poverty levels, people should use the 2025 dollar figures to estimate eligibility and applicable percentages. Commentary sites warn the 2026 applicable percentages (how much of income a person is expected to pay toward premiums) changed substantially from 2025—saying they “double or triple” at lower income levels according to an IRS publishing noted by a secondary source—so the interaction between poverty level and applicable percentage tables can materially change out‑of‑pocket obligations even if the poverty numbers themselves are the prior year’s figures [5].
6. Limitations, recommended next steps, and where to get authoritative values
My reporting here is limited to the provided documents: the Federal Register explains the 2.9% adjustment [1] and multiple guidance sites confirm that coverage‑year 2026 uses the 2025 poverty guidelines for eligibility [2][4]. For an exact percent change by household size you need: (a) the official 2024 (or 2025) guideline table being compared and (b) the subsequent year’s guideline table. Those pairwise tables are not present among the provided sources, so obtain the primary HHS/ASPE poverty guidelines PDFs or the Federal Register tables directly and then compute percentage differences per household size. The Federal Register 2025 notice is the authoritative starting point [1].