It's been pretty obvious to me over the last 50 years that it's become more common, examples all the time from first hand experiences and in our culture - TV & other media. The woman who won a $1MM lottery, kept taking food stamps and didn't see anything wrong with it - really? How common stealing mp3's online or copying CD's and DVD movies became about 10 years ago, millions of people didn't see anything wrong with it. Two of hundreds of examples, but I suspect we'll disagree anyway.
If you want "data" read the chapter on "Honesty" in Coming Apart. Fortunately it's still a minority, just much larger than generations ago.
I don't see where 'agreeing' or 'disagreeing' has a place in this. Would we 'disagree' on the recorded high temperature at ORD on a certain date? It either is X or it isn't.
'Lying, cheating & stealing are far more common now than they were when most of us were kids, no comparison...', or they weren't. Our perceptions might be different, but the facts can't be.
It's obviously not as easy to measure as temperature, but when you say there is 'no comparison' that seems to say it ought to be obvious to anyone. I'm not so sure it is.
We could trade anecdotes till the cows come home, but there is no value in that.
But taking your one example, stealing mp3s - well, I recall plenty of people copying/swapping purchased LPs to Cassette tape. And that took physical access to the LP, a connection with a person willing to allow it to be copied (I sure wouldn't loan my precious LPs to someone with a crappy, dirty, worn needle that tracked at 10 grams!), a cassette recorder and phono with the proper line in/out connections, and it took time.... slower than real time, with the pauses, miscues, plus trying to figure out if you can fit that next song on that side of the tape (base 60 math anyone?), and oh wait - it clipped, go back and re-record at a lower level, ooops, it skipped, try that track again. And then, (oh horrors) you have to manually write the titles of the tracks on that little cover sheet in the case.
Now, compare that with stealing an mp3. Many households already have everything they need. Click, and a minute later you've got it, complete with all the song info. And you can play it on something that fits in your pocket. No physical access, no one-on-one contact, one person makes it available to millions. EZ. Quick. No social skills required. No getting your hands dirty. Start it and go off and have a cola. EZ.
So was it wrong for the teens in the 60's and 70's to tape and then share LPs? Yes. Was it as easy as today? No. Would the teens in the 60's and 70's steal more music if it was easier? It seems obvious to me that they would. More than today's teens? Who knows? But I don't think it is obvious that they'd act differently, and I see no reason to think they would.
Now, I don't steal something just because there is an easy opportunity. But if we look at a big group, some will be on the edge, and easy will pull them over the edge.
Does the
Coming Apart book have real data? If so, I may take a look. But there are so many books/articles written to tell some group of people what they want to hear, I'm always a bit skeptical.
-ERD50