Approaches to Advance Gender Equity from Around the Globe: Collecting Transgender Inclusive Gender Data

To spur progress in the United States and support gender equity for health outcomes, Mathematica and its U.K.-based subsidiary, EDI Global will translate and adapt knowledge from initiatives in other countries to combat outstanding barriers—methodological and otherwise—to including gender-inclusive questions in population-based surveys. Our primary collaborators, who also serve as case studies in this effort are Statistics Canada, the Office of National Statistics (ONS) of the United Kingdom, and Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Censos (INDEC) of Argentina. These three statistical bureaus have demonstrated success integrating gender-inclusive questions into population-based surveys by developing a statistical standard for such questions. Each country context has relevance to specific aspects of the U.S. political, historical, and sociodemographic context, and presents specific learning opportunities regarding its technical progress to date. Mathematica and EDI Global see this project as an opportunity to provide implementers of key population-based surveys in the United States with evidence of successful efforts to implement gender-inclusive measures. These case studies will provide valuable input into the years-long process of creating a national statistical standard for a gender-inclusive measure, and to implementing related gender questions in key population-based surveys that are used to direct health program funding (e.g., NHIS, NHANES, NSFG). The resulting data will provide stakeholders, including RWJF and other health foundations and agencies, with crucial data about transgender and other gender-minority communities to better understand and serve these populations’ health needs. 

During the 20-month project, from December 2021 to July 2023, the project team will conduct a literature scan, a data review, and conduct key informant interviews at the U.S. Census Bureau, Statistics Canada, ONS, and INDEC, and/or key national population-based surveys commonly used by health agencies and foundations to target beneficiaries and program funding. The team will use within-case and cross-case analysis of the key case study sites to apply learnings from case analyses to a U.S. context using information gained from key domestic stakeholders.