In August 2005, the Census Bureau released its annual report on income, poverty, and health insurance coverage in the United States. The income and poverty figures in that report were based on money income alone and did not include the effect of important public programs such as the Earned Income Tax Credit and noncash assistance such as food stamps and public or subsidized housing programs. As in previous years, the Census Bureau is now releasing a study that includes the effect of these and other government programs on economic summary measures, such as median household income, the Gini Index of income inequality, and the percentage of people below the poverty level. This release includes fewer alternative income definitions than previous reports to provide a more focused assessment of the effect of government programs (cash and noncash transfers and taxes, including the effect of the Earned Income Tax Credit) on income and poverty summary measures. Unlike previous reports, the poverty estimates shown here use a single set of thresholds that differ from the official poverty thresholds, see Section V for details. The resulting alternatives illustrate how poverty estimates are affected when various types of noncash benefits are treated as income and when taxes are taken into account, while holding constant the measure of need (the thresholds).