Or asking people, in their native tongue, ‘generally speaking, would you say that most people can be trusted, or that you cannot be too careful in dealing with people?’ By these measures, Norway is heaving with trust (65 per cent trust each other) and wealthy, while Peru is wallowing in mistrust (5 per cent trust each other) and poor. ‘A 15% increase in the proportion of people in a country who think others are trustworthy,’ says Paul Zak, ‘raises income per person by 1% per year for every year thereafter.’
