Corruption is the natural state of human affairs. Anyone who has spent enough time in a developing country knows this. I recently read that, in pre-war Ukraine, the majority of Ukrainians obtained a driver's license by bribing an official. If you tried to get a driver's license legitimately, you would spend a whole week going through a maze of bureaucracy that was designed to encourage you to give up and bribe someone. I point this out because street level corruption is not commonly heard about in European countries. People who live in developing countries run up against street level corruption on a routine basis. So it is obvious to people in those countries that there is corruption at much higher levels, if not the highest levels.

The developed Western countries have been very successful in stamping out street level corruption (most Americans are not used to bribing a cop if they get pulled over, for example), but they have turned a blind eye to corruption at higher levels. The general population in these countries are left with an impression that corruption either doesn't exist in their country, or that it is quite rare and limited. A cursory review of the state of international banks' performance in "enforcing" anti-money laundering laws, or the recent bribery record of Western insurance, energy, mining, and civil engineering companies should give pause to any thoughtful observer. Indeed, the rich, Western world's form of corruption seems far more insidious and far reaching than the stories of street level corruption in places like Afghanistan or Ukraine.