nci logo
NIH
U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute

Standard Populations (Millions) for Age-Adjustment

Standard populations, often referred to as standard millions, are the age distributions used as weights to create age-adjusted statistics. Files containing standard population data for use in statistical software are available below. These contain the same data distributed with the SEER*Stat software. SEER also provides US Population Data which can be used for analyses with SEER*Stat or other software.

Starting with the November 2004 SEER submission of data (diagnoses through 2002), the SEER Program age-adjusts using the 2000 US standard population based on single years of age from the Census P25-1130 (PDF)External Web Site Policy1 series estimates of the 2000 US population. For the 5-year age groups, the single year of age populations are summarized from the five single-year of age populations. See 2000 US Standard Population vs. Standard Million for more discussion.

Standard Population Files

The standard population data files contain the following data:

  • US Standards (1940, 1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000)
  • World (Segi 1960) Standard2
  • Canadian Standards (1991, 1996)
  • European (Scandinavian 1960) Standard2

View the Standard Populations

Download the Data Files

File format information is provided in the Standard Population Data Dictionary.

1 Day, Jennifer Cheeseman, Population Projections of the United States by Age, Sex, Race, and Hispanic Origin: 1995 to 2050, U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, P25-1130, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 1996. (http://www.census.gov/prod/1/pop/p25-1130/p251130.pdfExternal Web Site Policy)

2 The labels for these standards were updated on November 1, 2012 to clarify which standards they correspond to, but the data did not change. Documentation for the standards are in the World Health Organization's publication, Discussion Paper 31: Age Standardization of Rates: A New WHO Standard (PDF)External Web Site Policy