Workplace organization, and comparative economic development

I propose and test a bottom-up channel through which trust between parties to anexchange can go on to affect comparative economic development of societies as awhole. My approach revolves around the autonomy that employers (principals)grant to workers (agents), which is a key feature of workplace organization.Analyses using measures of the cultural component of trust confirm myhypothesis that higher social trust leads countries to specialize in industriescharacterized by high levels of work autonomy in their production processes. Mykey contribution is to integrate the microeconomic literature on workplaceorganization with the macroeconomic literature on trust.