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I’m fascinated by the extent to which sharing economy platforms like Uber and Airbnb are getting Americans to trust each other again. Over the last 40 years, the level of trust in society has fallen quite dramatically. Less than 1 in 5 Americans under the age of 35 today feel that people are trustworthy in general. But in parallel, we’ve developed a heightened level of trust in strangers who we meet through a digital interface. There’s a generation that has grown up reading Yelp reviews, reading Amazon reviews, making their consumption choices based on what strangers on a digital platform say. And so someone who we interact with who comes accompanied by online reviews, a Facebook and LinkedIn profile, and other digital cues seems to be someone we’ll trust at the level of friends and family. What excites me about this transition is that through history every time society has created a new basis for trust, it has expanded the economy dramatically. So I’m looking forward to seeing, as we trust our Uber drivers more, how this expands the world’s economic activities and the possibilities for trade.

The rise of sharing economy platforms like Uber and Airbnb is fostering trust among Americans, despite a general decline in societal trust over the past 40 years. Younger generations increasingly rely on digital reviews to guide their decisions, often trusting strangers as much as friends. This shift in trust could significantly enhance economic activities and trade opportunities.