How the numbers are made

A retirement plan is only worth what its assumptions are worth.

Most retirement tools ask you to take the output on faith. This page is the alternative: every rate and threshold the model runs on, the page it comes from, and the parts of Canadian retirement it doesn't cover. The figures below are generated from the engine itself each time the site is built — they are the numbers running your plan, not a description of them.

Checked against someone else's numbers

Getting a bracket table right is easy; getting the combined federal-plus-provincial rate right, including Ontario's surtax and Quebec's federal abatement, is where models quietly go wrong. So the engine's own output is compared against taxtips.ca's published 2026 tables on every commit. Both columns are below — the left recomputed by the same code that runs your plan, the right taken from the source, so you can check either one.

Every row agrees to within half a basis point. A row that stopped agreeing would fail the build.

Every figure, and where it comes from

Each of these is re-verified against its source every January through April, when the new year's rates are published. The engine's own tests refuse to pass until every jurisdiction has been re-checked, so a half-finished update can't ship.

How plans are compared

The goal isn't the lowest tax bill. Every comparison Encore Years makes — a CPP start age, a lump-sum split, whether to incorporate — ranks the options the same two ways.

1. Fewest shortfall years. A year where your household's after-tax income falls more than 5% short of your spending target is a shortfall. Retiring comfortably is non-negotiable — no plan with shortfalls beats one without, whatever the upside.
2. Then the largest after-tax estate.Among plans that clear that bar, the one that leaves the most after the tax at death wins. Lifetime tax only matters as the means to that end.

What the model doesn't do

Stated plainly, because a gap you don't know about is worse than one you do.

Some of GIS

GIS and the Allowance are paid, but the Allowance for the Survivor — for a widowed 60–64 — isn't, and a one-person plan is taken as single, not widowed. The year earnings stop is tested on an estimate of that year's income, as Service Canada allows; a pension that stops isn't. Choosing the years to leave the RRSP alone is a search over a handful of candidate windows, not a proven optimum.

The FHSA, and some locked-in details

The first-home savings account isn't modelled. LIRAs and LIFs are, with each jurisdiction's minimum and maximum, but not the alternative maximum some provinces allow (last year's investment return, which is lower than the formula at these returns anyway), the smaller maximum in the year a LIF opens, or the hardship and small-balance unlocking rules. Whether you're allowed the one-time unlocking is yours to check; the plan applies what you enter.

Your home, and other property

There's no real-estate account. Downsizing or an inheritance is modelled as a one-time cash event on the year it happens, which is enough for the planning question but isn't a property model.

Some provincial credits

Quebec's age, living-alone and retirement-income amounts are pooled into a single credit from 65, which understates credits at lower incomes. Of the provincial low-income tax reductions, Ontario's LIFT credit (on employment income only) and the amounts for dependants aren't modelled.

Corporations, beyond the basics

A corporation is modelled well enough to compare salary against dividends and to wind down retained earnings, but RDTOH, GRIP, the capital dividend account, eligible dividends and the passive-income grind are not in it. Treat corporate results as directional.

Attribution rules between spouses

Not modelled. Pension income splitting (T1032) is.

When the model changes

Changes that move the numbers are recorded here. A set of fixed sample households is re-run on every commit, so a change that shifts a result can't land unnoticed.

October 2026 — drawing the RRSP down before it's needed

The plan only withdrew from an RRSP when a year's spending needed it. A retiree whose pension, CPP and OAS already covered their spending left the RRSP growing untouched until the required minimums began at 72 — and those minimums, and the final tax return, then landed in higher brackets. A plan may now draw the RRSP each year up to the steady income it can sustain, spending what the year needs and saving the rest: TFSA room first (either spouse's), then non-registered. Whether to is decided per plan, by running it both ways and keeping the better, because paying tax sooner doesn't help every household. On our sample plan the after-tax estate rose by about $15,000; across 800 test households it rose on 218 and fell on none, and the plan's own withdrawal order now beats both common rules of thumb on 740, up from 723.

October 2026 — Provincial low-income tax reductions

Seven provinces cut their tax for low-income filers: BC, Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, PEI and Newfoundland and Labrador. The plan now applies each one, splitting a couple's family amount between the spouses, so a lean retirement year is taxed less, and the drawdown can plan around it. Newfoundland and Labrador's basic personal amount is now its 2026 figure of $15,000, and a corporation in Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia or PEI keeps the small-business rate up to that province's own higher limit. On our BC sample households the after-tax estate rose by under $1,000; lower-income plans in these provinces gain more.

October 2026 — CPP that matches your working years

Service Canada's CPP estimate assumes you keep earning what you earn now until 65. The plan used it as entered, so someone who stops at 58 — or whose corporation pays them dividends — was credited with CPP from years they never worked. CPP is now rebuilt from the plan's own earnings, with CPP's drop-out of your lowest years: a long career that ends a few years early loses little, a shorter one more. On our sample plan, where both people stop before 65, the after-tax estate fell by about $70,000. Plans that earn to 65, or are already retired, are unchanged.

September 2026 — GIS and the Allowance are paid

Plans used to leave out the Guaranteed Income Supplement, only flagging a year whose income was low enough for it. GIS is now paid, tax-free, on the year before's income — to a single pensioner, a couple on OAS, or one whose spouse isn't — along with the Allowance for a 60–64 spouse, from the published maximums and cut-offs. Because RRSP withdrawals cost up to 75¢ of next year's GIS a dollar, a plan within reach of it may now leave the RRSP alone for a few years, around 64 to 72, living on non-registered savings and the TFSA while GIS pays most. On 400 test households in reach of GIS, the plan's own withdrawal order now beats both common rules of thumb on 388, up from 283. Plans with income well above the cut-offs are unchanged.

September 2026 — plans that run out of money, paced to when they do

RRSP withdrawals were paced to last to the end of the plan, even when the plan ran out of money first. The RRSP then outlived the other accounts and had to fund spending on its own, at high tax rates, and the money ran out sooner. Plans that will run short are now paced over the years their money actually lasts. Across our test households this removed more shortfall years than it added. Plans with money to spare are unchanged.

September 2026 — couples: each spouse's RRSP drawn at its own pace

A couple's RRSP withdrawals were paced as one pool and then kept equal between the spouses, so a smaller RRSP could be emptied years early to match a larger one — leaving its owner with no taxable income to use their low tax brackets on. Each spouse's withdrawals are now paced over their own RRSP, and pooled only from 72, once pension splitting can move income between them. On our test couples the after-tax estate rose by up to $24,000; single-person plans are unchanged.

September 2026 — locked-in pension money (LIRA and LIF)

A LIRA can now be entered on its own. It pays nothing until it converts to a LIF, which then pays out between the yearly minimum and the maximum set by the pension plan's jurisdiction — the federal rules, Manitoba's and Nova Scotia's table, the formula most other provinces use, or no maximum at all in Quebec from 55 and in Saskatchewan. Before, a LIRA had to be entered as RRSP, and the plan could draw it faster than the rules allow. Plans without one are unchanged.

September 2026 — withdrawal order for non-residents

A non-resident pays a flat 25% on RRSP withdrawals, so there are no low tax brackets to fill. The plan now spends non-registered savings first, then the RRSP, then the TFSA, instead of drawing the RRSP early as it does for residents. It also stops adding savings to a TFSA, which a non-resident can't contribute to without a penalty.

September 2026 — spreading RRSP withdrawals over the whole plan

The plan used to decide each year's RRSP withdrawal on that year alone. For households whose CPP and OAS are modest next to their spending, that emptied the RRSP by the late 80s and left the final years taxed at almost nothing — room a steadier draw would have used. Withdrawals are now paced so taxable income stays roughly level to the end of the plan, counting the final tax return at death as one more year to fill. On our own sample plan the after-tax estate rose by about $26,000; plans with larger benefits or balances are unchanged.

September 2026 — pensions that don't rise with inflation

A pension can now be marked fully, partly or not indexed. Previously every pension held its value forever, which overstates a plan holding a fixed private-sector pension: at 2.1% inflation, an unindexed pension loses about 40% of its purchasing power over 25 years.

September 2026 — growth assumptions from published guidelines

A plan's growth rate is now derived from your stock/bond mix and fees against FP Canada's projection guidelines. The previous default of 5% after inflation was higher than those guidelines imply for any portfolio, which made every plan look more affordable than it was.

September 2026 — corrected CPP and EI figures

Three payroll figures still held their 2025 values: the EI rate and ceiling, and the maximum CPP pension used to cap a survivor's benefit. All three now carry a source and a test that fails if they go stale again.

Found something wrong? That's genuinely useful — tell us which figure and which source, and it gets fixed and recorded above.

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