Dylan entered the 60s just out of his teens. MacColl was a generation older(+25 years) MacColl went through the depression and WW2 and by the 69s the world had changed dramatically. From the mid to late 50s teens had money and could set their own styles and music and had a freedom MacColl could have only dreamed of. Dylan took to it like a duck to water and from the time he moved to Greenwich Village in early 61 he was on a magic carpet ride of fame and fortune that MacColl could only dream of. By contrast Ewan MacColl had had a hard life learning his acting craft in a series of small venues in a time when money was scarce for everyone. I can well appreciate that MacColl could have felt that Dylan had an easy ride. It is a matter of record what he thought of Dylan but then he had a very specific vision of what folk should and should not be. His own songs reflected workers(downtrodden or otherwise, whereas Dylan tapped into the antiwar sentiment. Both were craftsmen of their trade but went in different directions.
Had Ewam Macoll hit the 60s as a 20 year old I wonder how close he would have been to Dylan? Would he have fixated on the working man or perhaps Vietnam and the bomb? I suspect he was irritated by a young whippersnapper coming along and performing profound lyrics that matched in quality his own body of work. But that is purely my opinion. I think that was I MacColl i would have a degree of resentment at how the world fell at Dylan's feet despite him committing the cardinal sin of going electric. The young upstart held nothing sacred-but is that not the prerogative of the young?