In fact, they often come up with remarkably similar results; their forecasts this week for the cumulative 10-year surplus were within $20 billion of each other, a tiny rounding error.

When Bush took office, his budget team estimated there would be a cumulative surplus of some $5.6 trillion over the next 10 years.

WHEN the Bush administration took office in early 2001, the federal government was expected to produce a cumulative surplus over 10 years of $5.6 trillion.

The cumulative surpluses, including interest earnings, of these trust funds and other government accounts have been invested in Treasury securities, almost always nonmarketable.

Debt held by government accounts represents the cumulative surpluses, including interest earnings, of these accounts that have been invested in Treasury securities.

It showed a cumulative surplus of more than five trillion dollars.

The budget office said it expected the cumulative surplus from 1999 through 2008 to be $1.55 trillion, more than double the $671 billion it projected in March.

The reduced availability of imports and the war's beneficial effects on both the quantity and price of Argentine exports had combined to create a US$1.7 billion cumulative surplus during those years.

There were 281 billion extra dollars in the budget that year, and the Bush administration, looking a decade ahead, predicted that a cumulative $5.6 trillion surplus would build up by 2011.

When Mr. Clinton left the White House in 2001, the Congressional Budget Office was forecasting $5 trillion in cumulative surpluses over the next 10 years.