
The economic value of trust is staggering - nabla9
https://www.ft.com/content/75646b30-c094-11e8-95b1-d36dfef1b89a
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AnimalMuppet
Ravi Zacharias tells about being in Holland and walking to a dairy. At that
dairy, you walked in, took the milk you wanted, and left your money. Nobody
was there to check on you. That's trust. Zacharias observed that, in a less
trusting society, you would have to have someone there to keep people from
stealing the milk and/or the money, _and those people are completely wasted as
far as economic productivity is concerned_. They produce nothing; they only
prevent losses. IIRC, he said, "In India, someone would steal the money."

Zacharias told this to someone from Egypt. The Egyptian laughed and said, "We
would steal the cows."

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nabla9
I saw a test of these type cultural differences in TV-show once.

They had tourist groups from different countries into a otherwise empty bar
where the bartender had to leave. One of the tourists was an actor with same
nationality. He started to steal drinks and beer from the tap and tried to get
others to join.

British tourists were first little taken aback but then started to laugh and
some joined.

Japanese tourists were horrified and visibly shaken. They turned their backs
to the actor. After the bartender came back, the oldest man of the group talk
to the bartender, revealed what had happened and apologized on the behalf of
the group "I hope you don't think all Japanese are like this."

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nabla9
past the paywall [https://outline.com/5D7Dvf](https://outline.com/5D7Dvf)

