Trust and management:Explaining cross-national differences in work autonomy

We open the black box of what goes on in firms in terms of management of their operations. Work autonomy is a key aspect of firm organization and we test the hypothesis that societal trust affects the level of autonomy that firms grant to their employees. Analysis of up to 189,213 individuals from 30 countries shows that trust is indeed highly conducive to work autonomy. This result is robust to controlling for a wide range of other features of countries’ institutional environment, including measures of labor regulations and institutional quality. Our findings highlight the importance of informal institutions such as societal trust in shaping economic activity