Have you ever paid a bribe?

[Warspite]

I think it would be useful to differentiate bribes and extortion.

In my mind, if I pay a corrupt official cash to do something for me that he is not supposed to, that's a bribe. If I'm told by an official that something unjustified and undesirable will happen to me unless I pay, or he won't do his duty unless I pay, that's extortion.

I am not bribing a policeman if it's the end of the month and he pulls me over on a clearly invented traffic charge and threatens to impound my vehicle unless I pay him £5 in the local currency.

[DontSayBanana]

Nope. It's just very uncommon here in the US.   Odd that they didn't have any data on the US, UK, France, Russia or China.  I'm under the impression that bribery is extremely common in Russia, fairly common in China and not unheard of in France.

The article says that Russia was left out due to questionable data validity.  It probably is widespread, but corruption's so widespread over there that it's insanely difficult to get an accurate portrayal of it out of the country.

The way the US government's compartmentalized, they'd need a sample size of, say, 25,000 (500 per state) to get an accurate picture of the way it's broken down- otherwise, places like Detroit or Atlantic City would bleed into the representation of areas that have less of a problem with it.

[Valmy]

not unheard of in France.

I would suspect it is about as not unheard of as Spain and Italy and they are included.

[Valmy]

Why no data for so many western countries?

I imagine they're less of a priority for Transparency International.

Whereas those shifty Canadians...

Is Latin America not Western?  I just assumed they are, having a Western culture and religion and geographical location, but conversations like these make me think some people do not regard them as such.

[derspiess]

Is Latin America not Western?  I just assumed they are, having a Western culture and religion and geographical location, but conversations like these make me think some people do not regard them as such.

They have a Western zip code and area code, but they're really on the other side of the tracks.

[HVC]

Why no data for so many western countries?

I imagine they're less of a priority for Transparency International.

Whereas those shifty Canadians...

Is Latin America not Western?  I just assumed they are, having a Western culture and religion and geographical location, but conversations like these make me think some people do not regard them as such.

they're western adjacent

[PDH]

When I was sailing, even though we had prior stamps on the passports, every Central and South American country we went to expected a gift in order for the local government official to give his okey dokey.  If we didn't it was made clear that it could take a week on our first stop in country to "sort it out."

[garbon]

Why no data for so many western countries?

I imagine they're less of a priority for Transparency International.

Whereas those shifty Canadians...

Is Latin America not Western?  I just assumed they are, having a Western culture and religion and geographical location, but conversations like these make me think some people do not regard them as such.

Well don't they still get lumped into 3rd world countries? Perhaps that's why.

[Malthus]

Nope.  Never paid one and never taken one in any profession where it would be illegal.

I like the way this is worded. 

[CountDeMoney]

Nope.  Never paid one and never taken one in any profession where it would be illegal.

I like the way this is worded. 

That's goddamned right. 

[Savonarola]

I think it would be useful to differentiate bribes and extortion.

In my mind, if I pay a corrupt official cash to do something for me that he is not supposed to, that's a bribe. If I'm told by an official that something unjustified and undesirable will happen to me unless I pay, or he won't do his duty unless I pay, that's extortion.

I am not bribing a policeman if it's the end of the month and he pulls me over on a clearly invented traffic charge and threatens to impound my vehicle unless I pay him £5 in the local currency.

That's fair, I should have worded the poll that way.

[The Brain]

Of course not.