Since I exited the second pension pillar in September 2021, the value of my former pension fund units has grown by 18 percent. Luminor offers other pension funds as well, one of which has increased by less than 7 percent. During the same period, however, prices for goods and services in Estonia have risen by an average of 42 percent. To put it mildly, people's money has burned away in the vaults of these funds.

To keep Europe's faltering economy running at all, I have to agree with banker Parvel Pruunsild, who says the money printing machines will soon start humming again.

So I sold a forest property, added the money I had withdrawn from the second pillar, my spouse sold her small attic apartment and together we bought a larger apartment in the Supilinn neighborhood of Tartu. The building, located on the banks of the Emajõgi River where we now live, is one of the city's most beautiful architectural gems. This apartment is truly ours — it's real. It doesn't exist as some sort of virtual abstraction.

In 2021, a €3,000-per-square-meter price for an old house was a fantasy even by Tartu standards, but that price has certainly risen significantly since, while pension funds have been tossed about in the crosswinds of war and an increasingly unstable economy. We paid for nearly half of the apartment out of pocket and are covering the rest with a loan. So we too are investing monthly in something tangible, and no one can tell me that I'm not.

Before World War II, people also bought property, often with loans. When Estonia regained its independence, no one remembered those debts anymore — what they did remember, and return, were the houses, if they still stood. Yes, houses can be destroyed in war, but wars most certainly destroy people's money. When revolution broke out in Russia and the Bolsheviks came to power, tens of thousands of French rentiers wrote off their Tsarist bonds as worthless.

Taking all this into account, it would be foolish even to ask what I want to leave my children: pension units that melt away like snow or real estate that I've loved, restored and poured my soul into.

In a way, I've made a pact with my children: I have something real to leave you, and I hope that, in turn, you'll support me in old age. No pension fund can replace children, because in the 21st century, our most important resource is not money — it's time. You can buy time with money, yes, but what you want most in old age is for someone to give you their time. And for that, there is no pension unit but children. A 30-year-old who believes a pension fund will solve all their problems at 70 is living in a dystopia, deluding themselves.

The desire to secure one's future in every possible way is understandable, and I don't blame anyone who chooses to keep saving in the second pillar.

When I was preparing to leave the pillar, most funds had been extraordinarily lazy for years when it came to earning money for their clients — while still collecting hefty management fees. People like me have done you a favor: scared that others might leave too, the funds have started working harder, although they still can't beat inflation. So the option to show a pension fund the door should never be taken away.

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