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Or possibly, our perception of "zero trust" is a very weird zero point, a very weird social construct, where the vast majority of individuals are in fact law abiding citizens who will basically follow the rules in all situations, despite the perception of low social trust and a total lack of effort towards enforcement.
This is exactly my point, we first worlders walk through life acting like the sky is falling because something-something social fabric is fraying, but if we look around at mundane stuff we ignore every single day, we see evidence of people acting for the common good.
I'm not particularly saying that my Wawa is special, or that Wawa is special, I'm saying that when we feel the need to not just leave food out for anyone to take at any time, that will be a significant indication of something bad.
People in Japan and Korea often leave the most expensive item on their person, such as a phone, laptop or DSLR, unattended to hold a place for them while they're off using the loo.
If you think you're in a high-trust society, you've seen nothing yet.
Well, I leave my laptop out to keep my space when I go to the bathroom too and I'm in the US. Not NYC, god forbid, but still....
But speaking of Japan, I was once waiting for a very chic department store to open at like 9 am with a handful of other tourists in Tokyo when I saw a (very small female) store employee standing outside, shuffling something around right outside the door. I looked over and she must have had thousands and thousands of dollars in yen in an envelope. I have no idea what she was doing or how often she does this, but I was shocked to see it and she barely winced seeing me (a foreign man) looking at her wad of cash. High trust society indeed.
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