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Retaining the Thin Blue Line: What Shapes Workers' Intentions not to Quit the Current Work Environment

Author

Listed:
  • Martin Gächter
  • David A. Savage
  • Benno Torgler

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the determinants of police officers' intentions to quit their current department. For this purpose, we analysed US survey data that included a large set of police officers from the Baltimore Police Department in Maryland. Our results indicate that more effective cooperation between units, a higher trust in the work partner (social capital), a higher level of interactional justice and a higher level of work-life-balance substantially reduces police officers' intentions to quit. On the other hand, high levels of physical and psychological strain and the experience of traumatic events were not correlated with the intentions to quit the department These findings suggest that police officers accept high levels of stress as inherent to the job of policing.

Suggested Citation

  • Martin Gächter & David A. Savage & Benno Torgler, 2009. "Retaining the Thin Blue Line: What Shapes Workers' Intentions not to Quit the Current Work Environment," Working Papers 2010-05, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck, revised Mar 2010.
    • Handle: RePEc:inn:wpaper:2010-05
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Quit Intentions; Turnover Rates; Job Satisfaction; Stress; Police Officers; Work-Life Balance; Fairness; Acceptance;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I1 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health
    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • J81 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Standards - - - Working Conditions
    • Z13 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification

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