Why has cheating become so pervasive? The book "The Cheating Culture" explores this question at length. If you don't want to read the whole book, try this short

Why has cheating become so pervasive? The book "The Cheating Culture" explores this question at length. If you don't want to read the whole book, try this short work by the author: http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/p/pod/dod-idx/on-campus-author-discusses-the-cheating-culture-with-college.pdf?c=plag;idno=5240451.0001.004 http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/p/pod/dod-idx/on-campus-author... Excerpt: "It’s also not surprising that winner‐take‐all competition would breed cheating in another area ‐‐ in the classrooms of elite high schools and colleges. These days, even the smart kids who already have everything going for them often cheat to guarantee their success. When I was writing my book, I spent some time looking into the cheating problem at Horace Mann, which is one of the top prep schools in New York City. Students there are from extremely well off families. In the grand scheme of things, if you’re a student at Horace Mann, you’ve already won the game of life. Paying $20,000 per year for their children to attend, parents of these kids are loaded. And yet cheating is common at the school. Why are the most privileged kids cheating? There is no single reason why students cheat. But in this case, certainly one reason is the intense desire to be a winner, to get the rewards at the top. The Horace Mann kids are remarkably worldly. They know what partners at big name investment firms make. They understand just how just big the rewards are if you’re a winner and make it to the very top of American society. Many feel entitled to those rewards. And these students come to believe from early on that a key to being a winner – perhaps the key – is a degree from a prestigious university, the ivy leagues. And some of them will cut whatever corners are necessary to attain that goal. Now, of course, the obsession with winning is not the only reason people cheat. A lot of people aren’t out to strike it rich or become a big shot. They just want to lead a comfortable and secure life. But increasingly, that is not something one can take for granted, and more people are afraid of falling behind, and not being able to lead that comfortable, secure life. This brings me to a second reason people cheat, which is fear. Things are tough out there. Jobs are less secure, and even the best white collar jobs are now getting outsourced to China or India, disappearing just like that. 45 million Americans lack health insurance, which makes us unique among advanced nations. We just don’t look out for our fellow citizens like we once did. And a lot of middle class Americans who should be feeling secure are instead feeling anxious. And their kids are growing up around this anxiety. I think there are a lot of young people who go through life, thinking “I better not screw things up. One lost scholarship, one flunked exam, if I take one wrong step, get one blot on my permanent record, I’ll end up living at home for the rest of my life.” When you make the rewards for being a winner and the concomitant punishments for being a loser so large, don't be surprised when people start cheating en masse.