Cash is king for lost wallets

People are more likely to return a lost wallet if it contains money — and the more cash, the better.

That’s the surprising conclusion from researchers who planted more than 17,000 “lost wallets” across 355 cities in 40 countries, and kept track of how often somebody contacted the supposed owners.

The presence of money — the equivalent of about $20 in local currency — boosted this response rate to about 51 per cent, versus 40 per cent for wallets with no cash. That trend showed up in virtually every nation, although the actual numbers varied.

Researchers raised the stakes in the US, the United Kingdom and Poland. The response jumped to 72 per cent for wallets containing the equivalent of about $140, against 61 per cent for those containing $20. If no money was enclosed, the rate was 46 per cent.

How can this be?

“The evidence suggests that people tend to care about the welfare of others, and they have an aversion to seeing themselves as a thief,” said Alain Cohn of the University of Michigan, one author who reported the results in the journal Science.