>If inflation is higher than what you can earn from a saving account, then how is it rational to "save" anything?

general security? You don't need to (nor should you) hoard 10% of your finances for all 40+ years of your career into a low interest savings account. But you do want to keep a decent amount in case of various downturns. a high CoL city where you pay not much more for "things" can help with that.

Can also help pay for an financial advisor who will happily play with the monopoly money for you. Delegation is a great "experience" to consider when comparing costs of living.

When you buy car, fly planes, or shop at Amazon, you do not get a discount for living in a low cost of living area.

So the bigger number matters because many products are the same price ecerywhere in the world.

> but then you have to spend attention on the market circus with additional worrisome mental load that you can actually lose everything.

Not true. You can just buy a slice of the whole economy.

Then the only situation in which you lose everything is that in which your dollars would be worthless anyway.

No, just VTI and chill, it's the FIRE / Bogleheads model, and it works very well. No one who saves money for retirement should literally be doing so via a savings account. Sadly, not too many people know this then wonder why they're poor when others are rich come retirement age, not understanding the power of compounding in the market.

Where do you learn about these things? Having grown and living in France, I was never given a word about it, not even at university. We are supposed to have state managed retirement plans, but given the shady future of France, I’m starting to wonder what I should do to ensure I can either reach a retirement that also take into account being able to backup my two kids as they grow up.

Look up for Ben Felix on YouTube. Lots of free useful guidance!

Reddit. /r/personalfinance, /r/financialindependence (for Europeans, /r/eupersonalfinance and /r/EuropeFIRE) etc. Read their wikis.