What do Cumulative spending and Cumulative taxes mean?

These saved-run measures add the relevant spending or tax amounts over the projection horizon. They are lifetime totals for that run, not one year’s budget, an annual average or an account balance.

Spending is money consumed or given away under the plan, including supported spending generated by the calculations. Deposits into savings are not automatically spending. Taxes are accumulated from the model’s reported tax amounts; inspect the detailed tables when you need to distinguish components or final-year effects.

Use the same dollar basis and horizon when comparing totals. Adding future-dollar amounts across decades gives a different total from adding their today’s-dollar equivalents. A longer lifespan can also increase lifetime spending and tax without making the plan worse.