Why does the Army appear to have a discipline issue with the lower enlisted ranks?

I retired in 2013, so my perspective is a little dated. Discipline always seemed to vary from unit to unit, culture and climate in the organization usually being the main factor. Although, I think every branch probably has its issues and culture/climate being the root cause. For example, the USMC making the news with hazing incidents, usually E-3's and E-4's asserting themselves over the new privates in ridiculous ways. That would be a discipline problem in its own right, but that behavior is frowned upon in public, and condoned behind closed doors. If it is against policy, why does it keep happening? Maybe its the culture. Same goes for poor discipline in some Army units. If its allowed, it becomes the culture and will keep happening until leadership changes the culture.

Once the army introduced stress cards for the recruits, that was the begining. Also, the young soldiers now have this short term mentality, meaning they don't know or even care that their actions will have long term effects on their careers or even their lives.

Lloyd James Austin III as secretary of Defense is about as weak as General Patton was outspoken while Gen. Milley is so “woke” he has to study his new enemy, the “ANGRY WHITE MAN” as part of his CRT and indoctrination. Not to mention his phone call Democrat influenced phone call to his CCP counterpart to reassure that he would warn them in case president Trump ordered an attack on China. There lies your problem our alleged leaders from dementia Biden to the whole democratic administration weakening our military.

For a long time coming, these young enlistees feel entitled, you can’t touch them and are filled with cockiness because it’s become so hard to discipline them. For years even long after my retirement, service members out in public do not have the respect they had for officers, NCOs and veterans. So they get by with things time after time with no consequences for their behaviors. This seem to be carried over from their civilian life. Without discipline, there is no separation of leader and the student.

This has been a growing problem for the Active Army since at least '01 and is practically a disease in the Reserves and Nat Guard units.
This all started around 2000/01, the Liberal parent sorts were all worried about training cadres hazing, over-stressing, and emotionally abusing their poor, sweet babies during Basic, airborne, and other schools. In response the Army adopted 'stress cards' for the little darlings going through Basic. These cards were like mood rings; whiny kid puts his/her thumb on the designated area of the card and it turns a certain color based on whatever it was those things "detect". If it turned a certain color, then whiny kid was stressed and drill cadre were no longer allowed do their jobs until the card indicated the kid was no longer being stressed.
(You can probably hear the eye-rolling I am doing)
I am not sure if these cards were used in other training scenarios, like airborne school but I watched a few news articles at the time about airborne qualification badges no longer being blood pinned as had been the tradition because it had upset some parents, who deemed it as hazing.

In Reserve and NG units, the discipline problems stem largely from too much familiarity within the units and the "Good Ol' Boy" syndrome.
It is a literal possibility to become the Top NCO (1SG or CSM) and never, ever leave the unit. Officers get shuffled around a bit more but it is still possible to end up in command of the unit you started as a 2nd Lt. in and still know every senior NCO when you take command as a Capt. or Lt. Col.
Fraternization and the use of first names between all ranks of Enlisted and Officers is very common.
I have also seen 'legacies' join Reserve and NG units; units where fathers and/or grandfathers had been a part of and likely retired from the unit, a good portion of the unit watched these kids grow up.

Bit ironic. The one time I got into major trouble was disrespecting a corporal. At the time, the standard to be promoted to corporal at that post, and some said Army wide, was to be infantry, any of the infantry specialties. There were some that were other MOS's, and I was put underneath one. The unit was winding down, as the specialty, HAWK missile batteries, were being discontinued in favor of Patriots. The corporal in question was always giving orders, never followed up or followed through, just reporting to cadre that were working on removing me from the Army(another problem). I was sent out on the last field exercise to use the HAWKs, and was responsible for bring certain requested equipment for the exercise. The corporal was given the request, took it to other cadre, and came back with a different list, less than half of what had been requested for the exercise. I went to the senior NCO I would be reporting to regarding what had been authorized, and no one would return or respond to phone calls. I ended up working directly with my supply sergeant, E-6, who authorized the original request and allowed me to take the equipment. Long story short, come back from exercise to be told I will face charges of theft and misappropriation of government equipment, and no one in the chain of command will assist me in getting said equipment returned to field ready in my allotted 72 hours. Parts that had been donated to get this unit up to speed by me, were requested back if not needed, and low and behold, said corporal suddenly shows up to start yelling about adding even more charges if I return the needed equipment. He threatened me with an a$$ whipping, I told him to bring it on. I lost rank as that chain decided to hold to the letter of all forms of punishment they could meet out over the next two weeks. Yes, I should have not played the game, understood it for the set up that it was. Not my proudest moment in the Army. Sadly, I saw this at all levels of rank, junior through officer, and some dont ever take to heart the responsibility and commitment they are getting themself into, and dont adapt.

Individual observations don't add up to a picture of the Army as a totaled. The old expression, exceptional claims require exceptional proofs. To say the Army is going to hell in a hand basket does require some rigorous proof. How you get it is another can of worms.

I think I answered this one already. But in case I didn't, it definitely isn't limited to the junior enlisted. Lack of discipline exists within ALL of the Army populations. I want to say it's the trickle-down effect where Joe or Jane see their leaders do the wrong thing and not face the repercussions of doing the wrong thing or how junior leaders see senior leaders do that same kind of thing and not be held responsible, yet these junior leaders are expected to teach Joe & Jane to "do the right thing" and they respond with something like, "well SFC, 1SG, SGM, LT, CPT, MAJ, or COL so and so did this or that. So why can't do it, too?" It happened a lot during my career.

Causes:
Woke
Cancel culture
LGBTQ+............
CRT
Inclusiveness

Your perception of the situation is wrong. The army has actual people who are being trained to think for themselves, and the marine corps has a bunch of fanatics running around trying to be the ultimate marine.

Furthermore, if you were interacting with reservists and National Guardsmen, then you were dealing with a completely different set of people.

I was specialist in my unit, I had a master's degree in Public Administration, and I supervised 5 employees, who were professional planners. When I worked retail going through University, i ran a store with 30 employees. That means as a specialist, I had more managerial experience and direct leadership experience than my Platoon Sergeant who was a Correctional Officer in a prison, with no supervisory role. My platoon leader was fresh out of Officer Basic Course, and was some type of set designer for the film industry, and he literally did not know shit about being on active duty, let alone anything about how to run a scout platoon.

And MY BN Co? his active duty time consisted of making 3rd class as an HM int he Navy, and then spending the rest of his time as some type of AGR administrator for the counter drug operations. My BN XO was a PFC in the Marine Corps before getting his commission, and my fucking company commander had been in the guard so long he had a federal commission with an ASSOCIATES DEGREE, after, wait for it... serving in the Marine Corps as a PFC.

We as enlisted men ran our unit, because the officers were worthless, and in many situations the NCO's were too.

While this may be an Army wide phenomenon, I have seen it manifest itself in society as a whole as a lack of respect. I am a retired teacher, and a couple of years ago, I had a mother come to me and tell me in no uncertain terms that HER son would not call me sir. I was shocked. If I had not called a teacher sir or ma'm, my 1st Sgt dad might not have let me see the next morning.

Too many parents run to protect their baby, by calling their Congress members who run down there to pit someone in their place instead of telling the parents that their baby is an adult & their adult child decided to join the Army (in this case) & tell need to go sit down somewhere. It doesn't help when politicians want to play games with the military either.

Discipline in the Army. First you must gain respect. Once you gain their respect. Then the Soldiers will have more discipline. If the Soldiers don't like you then they will not have Discipline. Discipline comes with the morale of the United. If you have a chain of command that doesn't care about the troops. The morale is down which deals with discipline.

I think some of it is the fact that the majority of the lower enlisted ranks are young and immature still. They are testing the waters to see what they can get away with often. The Marines seemed to me to have much stricter expectations of the character of our branch. Yes, we also had some screw offs that needed a lesson or two (sometimes more) to get their act together. It didn't always work and after a while of dealing with them they were given an undesirable discharge. That was a last resort when nothing else really worked.

I would have thought that the "All Volunteer Army" would not have the lack of discipline and respect that seems to be a real problem these days. Is it possible that recruiting standards have been lowered too much? Is it possible that this problem is shared by NCO's and Jr. enlisted?

You wouldn’t have lasted a week in the Draftee Army. I was often an 18 year old, non high school graduate, Sergeant with a platoon of 23-24 year olds with some college. Yelling only made you look silly. The idea was to keep them focused on the mission, they wanted to get done as much as I did

Capt Wilford, I think it's as much the result of how the current generation of (many; perhaps even most) soldiers today were raised. Same old stuff --- tropies for LOSING; advancing through elementary and high school regardless of grades, etc. I had a principal tell me once during a Sheriiff's drug orienttion program for parents, "Our primary mob is to get these kids, THROUGH the system and OUT of school." She was dead serious, and I looked at her and bluntly stated, "Obviously EDUCATION isn't in your sylabus or your goals!" Fortunately, she only lasted ONE school year.
Recruits for many years now are pushed trough BCT and their MOS schools the same way. I once had a PV2 who was actually ILLITERATE ... every report he would write was spelled phonetically - such as:
Laceration was lassarashun, etc. When I had his partner re-write the DD Form 2823 with a Q&A format, when the kid signed it, he had to take his ID card out and copy his signature by DRAWING it! I asked how he signed the ID and he said, "My Drill Sergeant did it." We eventually got him chaptered out, but he's an example of how some instructors FAIL THE ARMY and also the Recruits.

Simple there is a problem in leadership.

For the same reason all the other branches do. We recruit children off the streets before their brains have even finished developing (human brain doesn't finish developing until approximately age 25).
From a biological standpoint, the bulk of the armed forces are cognitively impaired.

Could possibly come from 20+ years of toxic leadership on all levels that's run unchecked because of constant rotations. Even though the ARMY knows it's there, that it's costing them billions in attrition rates. They make the minimal effort to deal with it. How can you have respect for leadership that's constantly unchecked with known sexual assaults, domestic violence, substance abuse issues, etc...