Trust remains stable worldwide

DAVOS – Trust in business and government worldwide has been remarkably resilient through the economic crisis, except in the US where it has steeply declined, a new survey released yesterday on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) showed.

According to the annual Edelman Trust Barometer, trust in business is up two points globally since last year led by surges in Brazil and Germany. In the US, trust in government, corporations and media was down by eight points, to just 46 per cent of people saying they trusted all of those institutions – and trust in banks all but collapsed.The report comes as the annual WEF opens this week under a cloud of economic worries, concern over China’s growing influence in politics and business, and simmering anxieties over Europe’s debt crisis.Edelman chief executive and president Richard Edelman said the report showed recent financial crises have led to more skepticism, saying trust is conditional on what a company does and how it communicates.’Skepticism has increased as a result of the systemic impact of corporate and government crises, causing a transformation in the framework of trust,’ Edelman said.The survey’s findings on trust in business in the United States put it five points away from last-place Russia among the world’s top-ten GDP economies. Trust in government dropped six points to 40 per cent, putting the nation among the four countries with the least trust in government.In the Trust composite score, an average of a country’s trust in business, government, NGOs, and media, the US also fell to fourth from the bottom, while three years ago, it was in the top four.Worldwide, trust in most industries was up, the survey found. Technology held the top spot for a third straight year, followed by automotive and telecommunications.In the US, the automotive industry, which had floundered until government bailouts were given to General Motors Co. and Chrysler LLC, earned back half of the trust it lost in 2009 when its scores sank to 32 per cent compared to the 49 per cent in the new report.But financial services worldwide remained the least-trusted sector, with just 50 per cent, while 51 per cent did not trust banks.In the US, trust in banks plummeted, falling from No 3 in 2008 to second from last in 2011. The same was found in Ireland, where banks scored an all-time Barometer low for least trusted industry at six per cent. In the United Kingdom, trust in banks slid 30 points to 16 per cent. – Nampa-Reuters