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The Cheating Culture: Why More Americans Are Doing Wrong to Get Ahead

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Edit of 20 Dec 07 to add links.

I recommend that this book be read together with John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and William Greider's, The Soul of Capitalism: Opening Paths to a Moral Economy. As a pre-amble, I would note that a Nobel Prize was given in the late 1990's to a man that demonstrates that trust lowers the cost of doing business. Morality matters--immorality imposes a pervasive sustained, insidious, long-term, and ultimately fatal cost on any community, any Republic, and that is the core message of this book that most reviewers seem to be missing.

Any student of national security can tell you that one of the most important sources of national power is the population, followed by the economy, natural resources, and then the more traditional sources of national power: diplomacy, military, law enforcement, and government policies generally.

What this author makes clear is that our population has become a cheating population, one that cheats in school, cheats their employer, and cheats their clients (lawyers, accountants, doctors, all cheating). Such a population is literally undermining national security by creating false values, and undermining true values. Some simple examples: an estimated $250 Billion a year in individual tax avoidance; an estimated $600 Billion a year in theft from employers; an estimated $250 Billion a year in legalized corporate tax avoidance and investor fraud; and an additional $250 Billion a year in legalized theft form the individual taxpayers through Congressional support for unnecessary and ill-advised "subsidies" for agriculture, fishing, and forestry, as well as waivers of environmental standards that ultimately result in long-term external diseconomies...

At root, the author observes that pervasive cheating ensues from the perception by the majority that "everyone does it" and that the rules are not being enforced--that "the system" lacks legitimacy. In other countries, illegitimacy might lead to revolution, a revolt of the masses. In the USA, still a very rich country, the poor are cheating on the margins while the rich are looting the country, and we are not yet at a "tipping point" such as a new Great Depression might inspire.

This is a thoughtful book, and it does not deserve the negative comments from those whom the book most likely is describing all too well. Cheating diminishes trust and reduces value. America has become corrupt across all the professions, within Congress, within the media, within the political level of government (the civil service remains a bastion of propriety).

What price freedom? What price the Republic? You may or may not choose to agree with this author's diagnosis and prescription, but in my view, he gets to the heart of the matter. It's about integrity. We've lost it.

See also, with reviews:
The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism: How the Financial System Underminded Social Ideals, Damaged Trust in the Markets, Robbed Investors of Trillions - and What to Do About It
The Fifty-Year Wound: How America's Cold War Victory Has Shaped Our World
The Global Class War: How America's Bipartisan Elite Lost Our Future - and What It Will Take to Win It Back
War on the Middle Class: How the Government, Big Business, and Special Interest Groups Are Waging War onthe American Dream and How to Fight Back
The Working Poor: Invisible in America
Off the Books: The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor

In today's society, steroid-enhanced sports figures cork their bats, while corporate executives cook their books. In the days after 9/11, banking institutions whose networking system crashed saw their clients draw out millions of dollars they did not own. Parents push to have their children wrongfully diagnosed with learning disorders so they can have extended time on tests. Lawyers exaggerate expense reports; doctors get kick-backs for promoting vitamins; and commission-based mechanics work to find expensive problems on well-running vehicles.

All of these issues are discussed in David Callahan's "The Cheating Culture", as he tries to explain the boom in recent years of Americans trying to get ahead in life by dishonest actions.

One would think this author would find much in common with Bill Bennett, who recently published a book on the moral collapse of America. But if Bennett's book speaks to conservatives, "The Cheating Culture" is meant for liberals.

The author believes our current culture developed its morality during the "me-first" decade of the 1980s. Capitalism, according to the author, removes the socialist notions of caring for the community and doing what is right, replacing them with a Darwinist desire to win at all costs. Add to the overwhelming desire to crush enemies in a capitalist world is the riches that await those who succeed and it is easy to see why people cork bats, inflate expense reports, etc.

So, who is right? Bennett or Callahan? I enjoyed both books and think both authors make many credible points. Reading both books will give a reader not only two different theories on the moral decline in America, but will also show some fundamental differences in the ways conservatives and liberals think and argue.

The Cheating Culture describes an America where 74% of high school students have cheated on an exam, where parents pull strings to get their toddlers into the best pre-schools, and where it is standard practice to pad one's resume with non-existent degrees. Otherwise honest people under-report their taxes, splice into free cable TV, and over-report their insurance losses. Why do they do it?

David Callahan sees several reasons. One is that in the Winner-Take-All Society (brilliantly described by Robert Frank in his book of the same name), the rewards are huge. Another is that the risks are small -- even when people are caught cheating, there is little repurcussion. And in a society where so many are cheating, we are at a disadvantage if we don't cheat, too.

Most of the book is taken up with describing the (often fascinating) ways people cheat and what are the consequences, to the individual and to the community. When Callahan finally comes to what to do about this pervasive problem, he can only come up with rather mild suggestions. Parents should teach their children to do right, schools and businesses should conduct courses in ethics, the individual should "be a chump" and resist cheating and turn in anyone who does cheat.

This reminds me of the Seinfeld episode where Elaine threatens a cheating Jerry by saying "Someday, something bad is gonna happen to you!" and Jerry shrugs her off with "No, I'm gonna be fine."

In a perfect world, things would even out, and cheaters would get their due. In the real world, Kenneth Lay gets to keep his mansion and may never go to jail.

"Lately, conservatives haven't had much to complain about. Many aspects of Americans' personal behavior have changed in recent years. Crime is down. Teenage pregnancy is down. Drunk driving is down. Abortion is down. Opinion surveys suggest that Americans are growing more concerned about personal responsibility, as conservatives have narrowly defined that term. And much of the supposed 'deviance' that conservatives have anguished about for a quarter century has been waning.
"Still, cheating is up. Cheating is everywhere. By cheating I mean breaking the rules to get ahead academically, professionally, or financially. Some of this cheating involves violating the law, some does not. Either way, most of it is by people who, on the whole, view themselves as upstanding members of society. Again and again, Americans who wouldn't so much as shoplift a pack of chewing gum are committing felonies at tax time, betraying the trust of their patients, misleading investors, ripping off their insurance company, lying to their clients, and much more.
"Something strange is going on here. Americans seem to be using two moral compasses. One directs our behavior when it comes to things like sex, family, drugs, and traditional forms of crime. A second provides us ethical guidance in the realm of career, money, and success.
"The obvious question is: Where did we pick up that second compass?"

So asks David Callahan in this fascinating look at where we are headed in America. Led by doped-up sports icons, doctors with bogus prescriptions, auto repair guys who find more to fix then is really wrong, corrupt stockbrokers, and ready-to-buy politicians, the leaders of the parade are the corporate executives.

Of course, the amoral behavior by corporate executives is dictated by stockholders who, of course, are us and our parents and friends and our retirement portfolio managers.

So where are we all going?

"Cheating is not a new problem in the United States or anywhere else. It has existed in nearly every human society.
"In Ancient Greece, the Olympic games were rife with cheating. Athletes lied about their amateur status, competitions were rigged, judges were bribed. Those caught were forced to pay fines to a special fund used to set up statues of Zeus. Greece ended up with a lot of statues of Zeus."

There are a set of interrelated influences that the author believes are the cause of the current cheating epidemic in America--the increased pressures of job competition and insecurity, the widening rewards gap between the winners and losers in our economic system, the relentless trend toward deregulation that enhances temptation, and the belief by so many people that the system is so utterly corrupt that they have no fair shot at attaining the American Dream in an ethical manner.

THE CHEATING CULTURE is an eye-opening introduction to the real world. It will enlighten high school students as to how their peers are adroitly eluding obstacles that might interfere with becoming rich, famous, powerful, and going to Disneyland. The only worry is deciding which is more effective: buying term papers online or paying tutors to write them for you; purchasing the proper mobile electronics to be able to secretly bring your answers into the classroom or having your parents line up a doctor who can sell you the learning disability diagnosis that will permit you more time to complete standardized tests.

"The choice between being a winner or a loser in an economy filled with inequities seems stark and frightening to many college students. Says one student: 'Grades are the most important things which judge whether you go to medical school or to work as a janitor.' "

It is not surprising that Callahan finds these same students go on to cheat in college, grad school and--for those who thus successfully navigate their way to and through the sidewalks of the Ivy League--in a business world where untold riches can be scooped up at the expense of a gullible public that is unprotected by a deregulated, corporate-lobbied government.

This is an essay's worth of compelling material that has become tedious in book form.

Credit where credit is due: Callahan has identified a serious societal flaw (the cheating epidemic) and successfully identifies many of its root causes (a ferociously enequal, winner-take-all society, an everybody-is-doing-it mentality, the emasculation of enforcement mechanisms, etc.).

The problem is that, a fifth of the way through the book, he has said everything he really has to say on the subject. Subsequent chapters provide different examples, but offer no new insights and, as a result, feel awfully redundant. By the time he concludes with his (fairly obvious) list of recommendations, I found myself skipping pages (my own form of cheating) just so I could be done faster.

I think Callahan has something valuable to offer, but this entire book feels like it should be a chapter in someone else's book, not a stand-alone.

All Right, I may be naive, but I really didn't realize why tax cheating and corporate scandals are so rampant. Basically, Callahan statistically lays out how the chances of getting caught have never been slimmer.

For instance, there are around 17,000 publicly traded companies and even more mutual funds, brokerage houses, etc. Well, Callahan states that the SEC can only review the financial statements of about 6 percent of those. Also, the IRS has been gutted to such an extent that your chance of being caught cheating at your taxes approaches the chances of being struck by lightning...twice.

In other words, the rewards are great, the chances of being caught are slim, the punishment is light, and (this is the big thesis of the book,) the culture accepts the ability to get away with cheating as a marker of success.

I think your reaction to Callahan's arguments will be dictated by your politics and your worldview; a lot of his conclusions end in the growing gap between the rich and the poor.

One of the best things about his book is that it will teach you that if you are lying to your insurance company about where your car is registered, you shouldn't be making fun of Winona Ryder for her shoplifting.

The Cheating Culture doesn't come to any simple, easy solutions, but I don't know that there are any. The book is a relatively quick read.

Callahan's book deserves attention because we need to begin looking at the broader questions of "why a lot of things aren't working." Too often government and social agencies opt for a quick fix, such as longer prison sentences or denial of benefits, rather than examining the underlying question: "Why did this happen in the first place?"

Callahan neither points nor shakes fingers. He does not condone cheating but explores social influences that encourage and reward cheating. Most important, he shows how lines have blurred between cheater and victim. Many people cheat on auto insurance, he says, but in fact these poorly-regulated insurance companies turn their customers into victims.

And the institutions we're taught to trust, such as the medical system, cheat us too. Doctors who join multi-level marketing programs not only prescribe unnecessary products but also try to recruit their patients into a money-making scheme!

Callahan focuses on economic pressures that drive ordinary people to cheat, especially "Winner Takes All." If losing means losing everything, there's enormous incentive to do whatever it takes to win.

If anything, Callahan doesn't go far enough. He notes that parents hire "coaches" to help children get into colleges and "tutors" who sometimes do the work for the children.
But here's the irony. Many coaches, tutoring services and ghost writers earn more than teachers. Well-paid teachers with a reasonable workload might make their services unnecessary.

At one writing conference, a young man openly told a whole table of horrified listeners, "I earn a lot more ghostwriting term papers at the University of X than when I was an adjunct professor at the same university."

Then again, has any culture or civilization ever truly rewarded integrity? During World War II, the US government advertised buying bonds as an act of patriotism -- but some economists say the real motive was to tame the fires of inflation. Before the days of informed consent, who knows how many unnecessary medical procedures were performed? We may not be cheating more than any previous culture -- it's just harder to hide and we're more willing to point self-righteous fingers at those who are caught.

Like Callahan, I don't condone cheating, but I find myself frustrated with a system that punishes individuals who get caught while rewarding those who create situations that put those same individuals between a rock and a hard place.

David Callahan's new book, "The Cheating Culture," is a timely look at why and how so many Americans engage in morally ambiguous behavior in order to succeed in school, sports, and business. Some people cheat to make money; others do it to make themselves look more accomplished than they really are. Callahan explores not only why people cheat, but also how American institutions encourage cheating, and what we, as a society, should do to reverse this growing and alarming trend.

Callahan fills his book with a host of examples, including lawyers who overcharge their clients, doctors who are paid by pharmaceutical companies to prescribe inappropriate drugs, students who cheat on their SAT's, athletes who take performance-enhancing drugs, and corporate bigwigs who engage in financial chicanery. He also cites examples of famous cheaters, such as Michael Milken and Ivan Boesky, who were convicted and served jail time for their financial crimes, and Kenneth Lay, the top man at Enron, who has still not been prosecuted for his role in a huge scandal that rocked the business world.

"The Cheating Culture" is a thorough and very readable account of a serious problem in our society that receives far too little attention. The many anecdotes and interviews in this book bring home the pervasiveness and even the institutionalization of cheating in our country.

I give particularly high marks to the final chapter of "The Cheating Culture," in which Callahan offers his ideas for attacking the problem head on. The author suggests that we attempt to rediscover and reinforce the principles of honesty, teamwork, and shared responsibility in our homes, schools, and businesses. Callahan believes that children should be taught ethical behavior in school and parents should be careful to set a proper example for their children. He also suggests that the federal government take its role as a watchdog more seriously, policing and punishing those who evade taxes, engage in creative accounting, and steal from their shareholders. Before we tackle a problem, we have to recognize that it exists. David Callahan's excellent book is a step in the right direction.

"Why More Americans Are Doing Wrong To Get Ahead; the cheating culture," by David Callahan is a shocking examination of the declining value of "integrity," in our society. The author informs us that, "ambition often promotes deviant behavior...and that inequality in income is reshaping our politics as wealthier Americans get more adept at turning money into influence...twisting rules to their benefit and escaping punishment when they break rules."

Callahan thinks that there are four primary reasons for more cheating today...new pressures...bigger rewards for winning...temptation...and trickle-down corruption. He puts the spotlight on the law profession, "the years 1960 to 1995 witnessed the transformation of corporate law firms in America from small, dignified, prosperous, conservative, white male professional partnerships dedicated to serving their clients and communities into large, aggressive, wealthy, self-promoting, diverse business organizations where money is often valued more highly than service to clients and community."

In reality cheating is everywhere...on Wall Street, in Major League Baseball, in journalism, politics and in college admissions. Callahan thinks the key to giving people institutional faith is to promote a few simple principles...shared responsibilities...mutual respect...and compassion for the weak. He also suggests teaching more "integrity," on the American campus. Recommended.

Bert Ruiz

David Callahan's The Cheating Culture, is a flawed but nonetheless important book, particularly in the current, Republican-controlled era of free markets, loosening regulations, and tax policy favoring the wealthiest Americans. The examples are hardly original and mostly well-known, and the premises are relatively simple: that cheaters cheat because it's easier, because the payoffs are constantly getting bigger, and because the penalties border on non-existent. The scope is so wide that the book lacks depth, and the author's final prescriptions seem quaintly idealistic. What could easily be a nice article in The Atlantic Monthly fills an entire book here, making the text feel rather repetitive at times.

All of that being said, The Cheating Culture is still a worthwhile read. The very width of the scope is telling in itself, since it serves as a reminder of just how widespread cheating has become in American life. The effect is demoralizing for the reader, particularly when one recalls how different, and how much more moral, and self-monitoring, life was in the 1950's.

Callahan brings together the corner-cutting, law-bending, and outright illegal examples of cheating from all aspects of modern life in America, from small-scale cheating on exams in high school or lying about one's age for the Little League (Danny Altamonte) to corporate cheating by the likes of WorldCom and Enron. He addresses tax fraud, false advertising, promotion of legal drugs for uses other than those approved by the FDA, improper billing by lawyers, and touting of dot.com stocks by Wall Street analysts who knew the underlying companies were poor investments. Not all readers may be familiar with all his examples, so their mere breadth may be eye-opening for some who have not really put two and two together before.

Callahan's strongest contribution is his linkage of income disparity to the culture of cheating. The premise is not likely his original insight, but it connects the growing divide between the wealthy and the working poor to the willingness of nearly everyone to justify cheating because "everyone else does it." The author suggests that more and more average people will do anything to become part of the Winning Class, the wealthy few who have all the advantages and keep getting richer.

What's interesting about this book is also what the author does not discuss. He eschews religion as a counterweight to morality, preferring to focus on the vague notion of ethics. He also gives little insight into behavior in other countries, whether increased cheating is just an American cultural phenomenon or is endemic in the modern world. He short-changes the media's role in glorifying winners, and perhaps most significantly, he fails adequately to trace the cheating trend to its sources, the market glorifying, deregulated era initiated by Ronald Reagan. While cheating certainly existed before Reagan's Presidency, the current wave, and the government's inabilty to control it, surely began with cutting funding for the SEC and the IRS, loosening government regulations and controls, and establishing trickle-down economics as the basis for government economic and tax policy.

Personally, I was saddened by the very notion that such a book was so easy to put together. No special research was required, and no new scandals needed to be uncovered. Cheating has become such a part of American life that we can find it everywhere. From government to religious institutions, from education to sports to medicine, we cynically assume that everyone cheats, or will cheat, given the opportunity.

Callahan has attempted to pull this all together and offer some suggestions for how to change it. The effort is a noble one, but quixotic. Someone or something far bigger than a book will be necesary to shift America's moral compass. Still, the topic is worth talking about. This book might be most effective if read and discussed by high school and college students, those who can perhaps still be dissuaded from joining the Cheating Culture.