The U.S. Census Bureau has released the 2024 Community Resilience Estimates (CRE), which identify areas in the United States that are most socially vulnerable to natural disasters. The CRE provides data on how demographic, socioeconomic, and health factors can increase a community’s risk and hinder its ability to recover from events such as hurricanes, wildfires, earthquakes, flooding, strong winds, and winter weather.
This year’s release introduces new social vulnerability rankings for every county and census tract in the country by specific types of natural hazards. For the first time, estimates are also available for metropolitan and micropolitan statistical areas. The CRE offers detailed information about populations at different levels of social vulnerability at national, state, regional, county, and tract levels.
The data set includes an interactive map and tables that highlight the top 25 most socially vulnerable counties and the top 100 tracts with at least a “relatively moderate” rating for expected economic losses due to various natural hazards.
According to the Census Bureau: “Social vulnerability constitutes various adverse factors that can compound the negative impact of a disaster and that inhibit community resilience. These can be demographic, socioeconomic, or health characteristics of individuals and households in the community. The estimates and rankings are useful for local planners, policymakers, public health officials, disaster management professionals, and community stakeholders who plan mitigation and recovery strategies in the event of a disaster.”
The CRE is based on 2024 American Community Survey (ACS) microdata combined with population estimates from several sources including the Population Estimates Program and privacy-protected files from previous censuses. It measures social vulnerability using ten ACS topics such as poverty status, number of caregivers in a household, housing crowding level, communication barriers, unemployment rates, disability status, health insurance coverage rates, age distribution within communities, vehicle access availability among residents, and broadband internet access.
Natural hazard ratings used in this analysis are drawn from FEMA’s National Risk Index released in March 2023.
The full dataset is available for download on the CRE datasets webpage as well as through data.census.gov and via API access through official Census Bureau channels.
“Community resilience is the capacity of individuals and households within a community to absorb the external stresses of a disaster,” according to information provided by the Census Bureau. “The CRE uses 2024 American Community Survey (ACS) 1-year microdata modeled with 2024 population estimates from the Population Estimates Program, 2020 Census Privacy-Protected Microdata File, and Modified Age and Race Census file to measure social vulnerability that may inhibit a community’s ability to recover from a disaster.”
There was no formal news release associated with this product; it was distributed as an informational tip sheet.
