Economic theory has never really managed to incorporate Kenneth Arrow's (1974) basic observation that “Virtually every commercial transaction has within itself an element of trust, certainly any transaction conducted over a period of time.”

Admittedly, concepts such as social capital and social coherence have been the object of analysis for a number of years, but economists do not really take into account the massive importance of such factors.

If a society or community manages to establish common values, the cost savings are enormous. If, based on common values, people come to basically trust each other's motives, then the financial system will serve as an intermediary between savings and investment, the judicial system will translate into rules what the population already feels it is right to do anyway.

Alternatively, if a society is deficient in social capital, people do not trust each other, the financial system does not receive savings, which are instead hoarded in the form of gold or cash, there are few links between savings and investment, the judicial system's common rules will be interpreted differently by different social groups, leading to a cumbersome system that gobbles up resources and needs a large and expensive system to ensure compliance.

Without common values there is no trust among people. Trust means that people accept that decisions of vital importance to them can be made by other people.