Max Leibman20h ago

A billionaire enters a gas station. Seeing the "Leave a penny, take a penny" dish on the counter, he scoops up all of the coins and pockets them.

"I'm a genius," he says to the protesting clerk. "I earned this money. Anybody could have taken it, but only I had the vision to see what was possible."

Show threadJules she/her19h ago

@maxleibman when I was a student, and you can tell from the prices of coffee how long ago that was, I used to buy a cup of coffee at the station every morning on the way in to university. A black coffee cost £1, a coffee with milk cost £1.20. You'd pay at the counter and everyone no matter what they ordered got handed a black coffee, then you added your own milk from a jug by the door on your way out on an honesty system.

One morning a guy in a fancy suit pushed into line in front of me, which annoyed me enough to make me pay attention to him. He ordered and paid for a black coffee then added milk to it. And this guy singlehandedly taught me a lot about the sort of people running the world.

Show threadMartin Schlegel17h ago
@afewbugs @maxleibman come to Peru, I invite you to the nice little restaurant of my mother in law where we still sell the coffee at 3 Soles (ca.0,75€) black or 4 Soles (1€) with milk. Even locals told us to raise the prices. Ingredients both coffee and milk are local (as in grown amd processed all within 20min drive from here) and we still earn money on it. It's in the #selvacentral #huancabamba #oxapampa #peru the restaurant is called chicharonería shayapeña xD
Show threadMartin Schlegel

@afewbugs @maxleibman but on the main point yeah. If you travel a lot you will notice these high trust societies do still exist. In the rural area of Germany where I'm from it's still pretty good. But my best experience was in villages in the andean mountains, not connected by road. Have never seen more trust or honesty.

As a bonus and some sneaky propaganda for the peruvian mountain jungle, a photo of our restaurant: (nice national park in walking distance)

Mar 27 at 6:26pmWeb
Show threadMartin Schlegel17h ago
@afewbugs @maxleibman and we will bitterly regret not combatting the loss of that trust and the rule by sociopaths more fervently. In th US I think you're pretty f...d up already. In Europe it's less so but... and we need to find ways to get at least parts of it back.
Show threadMartin Schlegel16h ago
@afewbugs @maxleibman i think one of the most important and underrated tools (aside from our whole economic model) is city planning, small businesses and places. If you "feel" like you're in a cozy little community of similarly weird people, if I see our neighbourhood café as a cozy place run by someone I know, if I buy locally in a small shop where you great the people because you know them, a lot changes. And at least some of this can be achieved by city planning.
Show threadMartin Schlegel16h ago
@afewbugs @maxleibman that's another reason why the car centric cities of most of the US are so horrible for society. If I can and do walk to the park, to the café, to the small shop, to the bakery, so will my neighbours, I will meet and make connections with the people around me and learn to trust most of them. In a car centric city I take the car to a mega mall, a fitniss chain or a coffee chain on different ends of the city, most people I see, I'll never see again.