The affordability of water service is a large and growing challenge for the sector. Utilities are facing substantial costs to upgrade infrastructure and to treat for emerging contaminants of concern, but also are grappling with how to fund these efforts without disproportionately impacting customers. So discussions around affordability at the household level are important not only in the strategic planning and day-to-day operation of water systems, but also for state and federal agencies considering new regulations. In these discussions, it's important to recognize that affordability is a complex issue, and household-level affordability and the consequences of policy changes cannot rest on a single metric like median household income. Many stakeholders, AWWA included, have long advocated for better analysis of rulemaking to identify whether rule requirements are likely to cause affordability problems to low-income customers. Understanding impacts on fiscally challenged households is an important step to determining what can be done to address those challenges while still ensuring access to safe and reliable drinking water supplies. Under current practice, the US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) prepares an extensive economic analysis for new Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) regulations. That analysis includes determining whether—across the nation as a whole—the health benefits of a rule are greater than the costs of implementation. USEPA looks specifically at the household-level cost implications of drinking water regulations only for small systems with the question of whether a small-system variance (i.e., a less expensive but equivalently protective compliance strategy) should be available. And USEPA prepares analyses to address several executive orders, including Executive Order 12898, Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations. The panel emphasized that analyzing impacts on household affordability is not meant to reduce health protections for low-income customers or anyone else. Instead, evaluating the impacts of regulatory options on household-level affordability should provide an opportunity to modify draft rule frameworks and implementation strategies to mitigate impacts on low-income households and consequently alleviate disparate impacts. The panel's work sets the stage for improving current SDWA decision-making processes, which in turn will help lead to more informed decisions across the sector. Although work remains to fully demonstrate the recommended analyses, they nevertheless pave the way for a more informed future. Adam T. Carpenter is the energy and environmental policy manager at the AWWA Government Affairs Office in Washington, D.C. He can be reached at acarpenter@awwa.org.