Social trust and human development

A series of studies connect social trust to economic growth. In this paper, we explore the connection between trust and a broader measure of development, the UN Human Development Index. We find that trust is significantly associated with faster human development in the 1980–2005 period. The impact of trust occurs mainly in less democratic countries.

► We explore the relation between social trust and a broad concept of development, as captured by the Human Development Index.
► The results support the existence of a significant association between trust and the speed with which countries have developed in recent decades.
► We find that the effects of social trust are weaker the more democratic a country is.