I'm not sure that trust is the right word. If I had to guess, 'hope' might be more appropriate, because at some level we all know the reality of the situation,

I'm not sure that trust is the right word. If I had to guess, 'hope' might be more appropriate, because at some level we all know the reality of the situation, but I think we hope that it's not applicable to us. There would be a few factors driving this 1) The stress of not having a job is extreme, and represents a state that people try to avoid thinking about too much. 2) It is, in fact, true for many people, and we want to think of ourselves as people that it's true for, instead of one of the "suckers" that it's not true for.