The reform that was supposed to deliver better pensions is turning out to be a trap for those who believed in it the most. The governor of the National Bank, Trajko Slaveski, warns that as much as 70 to 80 percent of those insured under the second pension pillar will, upon retirement, fail to reach even a minimum pension - and will have to seek rescue from the state PIOM fund.

How did it come to this? When the second pillar was introduced in 2000, under pressure from the World Bank, one third of pension contributions were redirected from PIOM toward private pension companies. „One third of the funds being paid into PIOM went to private pension companies", Slaveski says. The result will start to bite around 2030-2032, when the first people retire through this system.

The numbers behind the private funds are damning. In just the first nine months of 2024, 11 million euros in fees were collected, of which around 5 million was pure profit - a profit margin above 50 percent. Two thirds of the pension system's deficit, according to the governor, stem precisely from the redirection toward the second pillar.

This has already happened once on a small scale: in 2019, around 16,500 early retirees from the second pillar were returned to PIOM along with contributions of about 40 million euros. Now it's expected to repeat on a much larger scale.

The lesson is bitter and familiar. A reform packaged as a modern solution, with promises of higher pensions, ended up charging citizens fees and leaving them with pensions below the minimum. And when the system collapses, the rescue is sought yet again from the very state the reform was meant to relieve. Who answers for 26 years of bad math - or, as usual, no one?