What the article doesn't mention but the store's website https://tot-go12.com/ does is that you need to pass through facial recognition to enter the store and there are multiple cameras tracking whether you try to leave without paying. (Maybe like Amazon Checkout where there's humans continuously monitoring the video feed.)
"High trust society" or not, you need some minimum level of security to avoid becoming a honeypot for all the less-trustworthy individuals that exist in any society. Maybe the highest trust here is in the police actually showing up and doing something about it when they report a theft.
rjh29 16 minutes ago [-]
There are plenty of unmanned frozen food shops (gyoza etc.) with one CCTV. On the rare occasion that someone steals food, it is taken seriously and investigated.
People have been arrested here for grabbing a medium combini coffee cup and using it to serve a large coffee.
bapak 25 minutes ago [-]
> the police actually showing up and doing something about it when they report a theft.
That and this whole concept can only happen in places with low criminality. In Thailand I occasionally find small shops that have a CCTV and that's it (but the total value of goods on display likely does not exceed $100)
socalgal2 5 minutes ago [-]
I wonder what does it take to get a society to have low criminality. IIUC Japan wasn't always this way. Could other societies become high trust? Singapore is. It wasn't always
madaxe_again 8 minutes ago [-]
Or just the insurers paying up because the police provided a crime number.
This is how it works in the U.K. - everyone has cctv, not because it prevents theft or allows the police to investigate, but rather because it allows you insurance coverage for any losses.
hilbert42 54 minutes ago [-]
That's wonderful, but it's not a big surprise for me.
When in Tokyo I encountered vending machines on a public street (the Ginza) that dispensed bottles of whiskey—Suntory if I recall—that operated 24 hours a day. If you wanted a drink at 3AM you could get it.
Where I am that vending machine would be vandalized overnight and the owner of such an appliance shop would be broke and out of business the next day.
Shame really.
Edit: A Westerner but longtime resident of Japan told me when I was working there of a hotel robbery where an American tourist had valuables and jewelry worth a substantial sum taken from her hotel room. The robbery was big enough to make the newspapers which led to the return of the jewelry. The thief after seeing the news story returned them with a message to the effect "Sorry, I wouldn't have stolen them if I'd known you were a visiting tourist".
Perhaps the story is apocryphal but it and other stories such as if you lose your wallet there's good chance it'll be returned complete with cash—is testament to the honesty of Japanese people.
adrian_b 36 seconds ago [-]
While visiting Japan last year, I have witnessed a scene when one of my companions forgot his wallet, which also contained an expensive smartphone, in a train, when we have changed quickly the trains, and someone from the other train ran really, really fast, to catch us in the other train and give the forgotten wallet to its owner.
Than he ran equally fast to his train, which was ready to leave. Had he not run so fast to return the wallet, he would have lost his train.
rjh29 15 minutes ago [-]
Those vending machines are supposed to check ID but I've never seen one do (I think cigarette machines do). They just turn off at night and apparently that's enough to stop children from using them.
Even shops with security guards dont work in the UK at the moment. It's a shame this could never be a thing here.
n4r9 1 hours ago [-]
It's tempting to see security guards as a basic response to criminal behaviour. But I wonder if the causality is more complex than that. I can easily imagine growing up under different circumstances to view society as a case of "me" vs "them", and I'd be more inclined to lift from shops run by people who clearly see me as enough of a low-life that they'd pay some thugs to man-handle me out.
smusamashah 25 minutes ago [-]
As a counter point, when I came to UK, it was super weird to see self checkout machines. Where I am from (Pakistan), I can't imagine anything like that. Although watched a video recently where in a rural area a guy left a cart of fruits on the side of road for people to buy the fruits and pay by themselves, at the end of the day cash was just little bit less than total amount.
These machines in UK felt like I was being trusted to pick items myself, and pay myself and I shouldn't break that trust.
Ironically I don't see these self checkout machines in Indian/Turkish/Kurdish etc super stores. In-fact, those stores trust there customers even less, they would ask you to leave your bags/trolleys at the door.
ballenf 49 minutes ago [-]
I'm blown away by a fridge costing <$100, used or not. Did I misunderstand the prices?
gregjw 44 minutes ago [-]
No, you didn't. Says 10,000 yen, so about 70USD at the moment.
avidiax 3 days ago [-]
Japan is obviously a "high trust" society, so I feel like this experiment will work.
I wish we had a way to make this sort of system work in a low trust society.
latexr 1 hours ago [-]
> I wish we had a way to make this sort of system work in a low trust society.
I’d rather we had a way to change low trust societies into high trust.
sfdlkj3jk342a 17 minutes ago [-]
After traveling for years, I often wonder how various cultures end up high or low trust. Wealth or financial inequality doesn't seem to be the main driving factor, despite seeming an obvious cause. Racial and ethnic homogeneity doesn't always explain it either.
Destruction of traditional culture by things like colonialism seems to be an important factor.
Eisenstein 21 minutes ago [-]
If there are consequences to bad behavior which results in real, felt, shame, then society will self-police to whatever values it holds. However, there can be downsides; for instance a lack of out-of-the-box thinking and individuality.
jwr 1 hours ago [-]
I used to buy firewood at National Forest camping sites in the US; there was a box where you dropped the money and then you grabbed a wood bundle.
Granted, this was almost 40 years ago, but this type of thing can work, even in less civilized places like the US.
gentooflux 1 hours ago [-]
They leave out more wood than a camper would even think to take because they only need one bundle every day or two. The sort of person who would need to steal a whole season's worth of wood is less likely to have the means to transport it all, and if they're so desperate that they'd go to the trouble then the Christian thing to do would be to let them have it.
Gillette razors on the other hand, are expensive to stock for their size, and easy to steal because of their size.
2muchcoffeeman 46 minutes ago [-]
I’d wager that outdoorsy people who are out camping in the woods are like a “mini-Japan”. The community has their own set of rules and behaviours that would make an honour system possible. Especially 40 years ago when it would have been more of a monoculture.
bombcar 3 days ago [-]
We do have a way - "high trust" enclaves inside the low trust society.
The modern examples in the USA are things like colleges, community centers, etc.
You gatekeeper the area and then everything inside is high-trust and you can get away with things like this.
You can also find it in rural areas and some very expensive islands, too.
45 minutes ago [-]
aomix 3 days ago [-]
While driving through upstate New York on a camping trip I found a maple syrup shop run on the honor system. Leave the money in an unlocked box. It was shocking. I bought a gallon.
petcat 1 hours ago [-]
I had the same experience in upstate NY. So many little boutique country stores with craft and art tables outside that just had venmo signs next to the crafts. My wife bought a few items and we were pleasantly surprised to see how many public purchases were made to that venmo account. And it wasn't super cheap junk/stuff either.
ElCapitanMarkla 2 hours ago [-]
We have quite a few road side stalls like this around where I live in NZ, Honey, eggs, swedes are a common one. You hear of the odd theft from them every now and then but for the most part it seems to work well.
ahoka 2 hours ago [-]
There are shops like that in Sweden and Germany, probably many other countries.
kelipso 3 days ago [-]
I wonder if this is actual high trust or that there are security cameras everywhere.
bombcar 3 days ago [-]
If you've been to the rural USA you'd know it's just high-trust (and the middle of nowhere). They're pretty common for low-value things like corn and farm produce; but I've seen syrup and honey, too.
There might be a camera but since there's usually no power, it'd have to be some sort of trail/game/deer cam. What would you do with the result besides some vigilante frontier justice? No cop anywhere but daytime children's TV is going to investigate the Case of the Stolen Syrup.
sometimes_all 1 hours ago [-]
We once went to Florida and saw some open orange farms. We wanted to buy some, but there was nobody in sight - we got very confused until we saw a box which said "$X a bag"; there was a sack of bags nearby. My mind was blown.
> No cop anywhere but daytime children's TV is going to investigate the Case of the Stolen Syrup.
Or Japan apparently, according to some of the comments in this thread.
46 minutes ago [-]
portaouflop 1 hours ago [-]
You can turn it into a high trust society. The mechanisms and procedures to achieve that are fairly well known.
deadbabe 1 hours ago [-]
High trust environments tend to crumble in society when you allow too much immigration. Japan’s xenophobia has worked well in this regard.
kcyb 53 minutes ago [-]
Switzerland is a diverse society with lots of immigration and it is also a high-trust society
deadbabe 29 minutes ago [-]
Switzerland is so small, basically a city.
antonvs 4 minutes ago [-]
Switzerland's population would make it one of the biggest cities in the world, more than double the population of Los Angeles, and more than New York City. Neither of which could be counted as high trust.
Havoc 38 minutes ago [-]
Also depends on type though. I’ve seen honesty boxes work out fine where the immigration consists mostly of professionals.
vasco 1 hours ago [-]
And a 99.8% conviction rate.
HPsquared 50 minutes ago [-]
Only 33 prisoners per 100k population (cf 541 in the US). Whatever they're doing, it's working.
It's a different system, they don't go to court without iron-clad case. Japan does not have a large prison population.
henearkr 40 minutes ago [-]
And they heavily influence (using pressure such as off-the-record interviews, and long detention times during the investigations) the suspect's statements so that it says what they need to make it a crime, even when it isn't.
Whatever the suspect may say afterwards, they just have to point out to the signed statement and say "but here you confessed".
Source: I have been directly living such occurrence lol.
That's what has been coined the "hostage justice" of Japan (referring in particular to the "long detention times during investigations" part above).
Towaway69 1 hours ago [-]
(2021)
w15v 23 minutes ago [-]
[dead]
whatsupdog 47 minutes ago [-]
[flagged]
Rendered at 10:40:53 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) with Vercel.
"High trust society" or not, you need some minimum level of security to avoid becoming a honeypot for all the less-trustworthy individuals that exist in any society. Maybe the highest trust here is in the police actually showing up and doing something about it when they report a theft.
People have been arrested here for grabbing a medium combini coffee cup and using it to serve a large coffee.
That and this whole concept can only happen in places with low criminality. In Thailand I occasionally find small shops that have a CCTV and that's it (but the total value of goods on display likely does not exceed $100)
This is how it works in the U.K. - everyone has cctv, not because it prevents theft or allows the police to investigate, but rather because it allows you insurance coverage for any losses.
When in Tokyo I encountered vending machines on a public street (the Ginza) that dispensed bottles of whiskey—Suntory if I recall—that operated 24 hours a day. If you wanted a drink at 3AM you could get it.
Where I am that vending machine would be vandalized overnight and the owner of such an appliance shop would be broke and out of business the next day.
Shame really.
Edit: A Westerner but longtime resident of Japan told me when I was working there of a hotel robbery where an American tourist had valuables and jewelry worth a substantial sum taken from her hotel room. The robbery was big enough to make the newspapers which led to the return of the jewelry. The thief after seeing the news story returned them with a message to the effect "Sorry, I wouldn't have stolen them if I'd known you were a visiting tourist".
Perhaps the story is apocryphal but it and other stories such as if you lose your wallet there's good chance it'll be returned complete with cash—is testament to the honesty of Japanese people.
Than he ran equally fast to his train, which was ready to leave. Had he not run so fast to return the wallet, he would have lost his train.
Honesty Boxes in Scotland (2024) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44824684 - Aug 2025 (59 comments)
These machines in UK felt like I was being trusted to pick items myself, and pay myself and I shouldn't break that trust.
Ironically I don't see these self checkout machines in Indian/Turkish/Kurdish etc super stores. In-fact, those stores trust there customers even less, they would ask you to leave your bags/trolleys at the door.
I wish we had a way to make this sort of system work in a low trust society.
I’d rather we had a way to change low trust societies into high trust.
Destruction of traditional culture by things like colonialism seems to be an important factor.
Granted, this was almost 40 years ago, but this type of thing can work, even in less civilized places like the US.
Gillette razors on the other hand, are expensive to stock for their size, and easy to steal because of their size.
The modern examples in the USA are things like colleges, community centers, etc.
You gatekeeper the area and then everything inside is high-trust and you can get away with things like this.
You can also find it in rural areas and some very expensive islands, too.
There might be a camera but since there's usually no power, it'd have to be some sort of trail/game/deer cam. What would you do with the result besides some vigilante frontier justice? No cop anywhere but daytime children's TV is going to investigate the Case of the Stolen Syrup.
Or Japan apparently, according to some of the comments in this thread.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarce...
Whatever the suspect may say afterwards, they just have to point out to the signed statement and say "but here you confessed".
Source: I have been directly living such occurrence lol.
That's what has been coined the "hostage justice" of Japan (referring in particular to the "long detention times during investigations" part above).