This is bouncing off Parker’s post and the comments in that thread regarding ethics. I agree that ethical behavior is almost impossible to teach to adults – if they haven’t developed a sense of honesty by adulthood, it is likely they are just flat dishonest. However, a code of ethics can be taught to fine tune a sense of honesty, and, also, a code of ethics can set a high standard of behavior that removes some of the gray area.
I imagine most unethical behavior is in the gray area where people get caught in a quandary regarding a choice between what is barely legal and what is the ethically best.
A code of ethics can help push basically honest people to bite the bullet when faced with difficult choices and do the ethical thing. When people have a choice between rationalizing and enriching themselves or denying themselves an instant gratification by making a decision based on a code of the ethics, it is sometimes easier to rationalize. This seems to be the slippery slope most people go down, rather than just out and out blatant dishonesty.
One thing about ethics though is that most actions, now that many laws have been passed to protect consumers, unethical are also unlawful. This helps the person on the fence make better decisions – we have laws for a reason. It is too easy to justify self-serving behavior.
It also comes down to short-sightedness and long-term thinking. Most bad decisions made in the gray area come back to haunt us. We usually lose more by being short-sighted and self-serving. Success is in the long-term mindset, the good reputation, the admiration and trust of peers, our self-esteem.