I can't even describe how much I relate to this :( Especially the Podcast part. I've literally read and listened to every single thing I could on increasing focus / concentration and nothing helped me yet.
Yeah, Americans idealizing Euro countries or cultures, especially the nordic and germanic countries are really annoying. Please leave your bike unlocked at any major Swiss train station and see what happens. Or take a walk at night around Rosengård in Malmö and come back to tell if you actually felt safe there.
It's always the same story: "I went to this upscale hotel where everyone is a wealthy tourist and travelled to the most commonly visited tourist spots and nobody stole my wallet / watch / umbrella. Amazing people." It's like those people have a psychological need for a fairytale country to exist where everyone is a "perfect" citizen and no harm has ever been done to anyone so they can daydream about living there.
If you left a library unlocked in a wealthy NY or Boston neighborhood I'm sure that you'd get a pretty similar outcome like the one mentioned in the article. It's not a mystery that readers are usually domesticated and fairly educated people who won't steal books, even in the US.