American trust in neighbors peaked at 77 percent in 1964

Evidence

By 1965 disrespect for public life, so endemic in our history, seemed to be waning. Gallup pollsters discovered that the number of Americans who would like to see their children “go into politics as a life’s work” had nearly doubled over little more than a decade. Although this gauge of esteem for politics stood at only 36 percent, it had never before been recorded so high, nor has it since. More strikingly, Americans felt increased confidence in their neighbors. The proportion that agreed that “most people can be trusted,” for example, rose from an already high 66 percent during and after World War II to a peak of 77 percent in 1964. — Robert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone The Collapse and Revival…, 28

Categorization

• XREF: Peak trust year is the baseline against which all of Putnam’s subsequent decline is measured.
• SHARE: The 77 percent trust peak in 1964 and its never-beaten status is a crisp, sharable data point for someone tracking the social-capital decline literature.