Different Paths to Job Satisfaction? Investigating Sector Differences using Representative Data

EasyChair Preprint no. 1132

Abstract

Sector differences in job satisfaction is one of the most studied topics in the literature sector difference, yet, the empirical evidence is still showing mixed results. Most of these studies mainly look into whether there is a sector difference and whether especially public service motivation has an impact on this sector differences. Salary and the preference for salary are often argued to differ between the public and private sector, and more importantly, it is argued that salary has a different impact on employees in the two sectors. Understanding the impact of salary in the two sectors is also increasingly relevant as performance management and performance pay is an often used (and criticized) part of NPM reforms. While former studies have looked at this relationship these studies have either used single source data and often only data from single occupation. In this study, we use a representative survey (with a high response rate: 57 percent) combined with longitudinal register data. This allows us to look at salary, and also changes in salary, and its relationship to job satisfaction – and at the same time to check for the potential differences between education and sub-sectors/industries. We find that there is a positive impact of salary on job satisfaction – yet not very substantial. Furthermore, we find that the impact of salary seems very similar in both sectors – also we did not find differences across education length in the two sectors. 

Keyphrases: job satisfaction, Public-Private differences, Sector differences

@Booklet{EasyChair:1132,
  author = {Jesper Rosenberg Hansen and Anders Villadsen},
  title = {Different Paths to Job Satisfaction? Investigating Sector Differences using Representative Data},
  howpublished = {EasyChair Preprint no. 1132},

  year = {EasyChair, 2019}}