I’ve been hip-deep in World Values Survey data the last couple of days while working on a chapter on economic growth and liberalizing value change. Here are charts of trends in several wealthy liberal democracies on attitudes toward homosexuality and prostitution. What you see are changes through the five waves of the WVS in the percentage of the sample in each country that said these things are “Never justifiable” on a 1-10 scale running from “Never” to “Always.”
In the space of about 25 years, the proportion of the population in all these countries saying homosexuality is never justifiable drops precipitously. However, the overall trend in attitudes toward prostitution is not so clear and generally less dramatic. What accounts for the difference? Here are a few possibilities, about which I have no evidence.
(1) Being versus doing. People just are homosexual, and it’s not up to us if we are. Prostitution on the other hand is an activity we can more easily choose to avoid.
Full Story from Will Wilkinson
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