Racial Harassment, Job Satisfaction and Intentions to Remain in the Military

Abstract

Our results indicate that two-thirds of active-duty military personnel report experiencing offensive racial behaviors in the previous 12 months, while approximately one in ten report threatening racial incidents or career-related discrimination. Racial harassment significantly increases job dissatisfaction irrespective of the form of harassment considered. Furthermore, threatening racial incidents and career-related discrimination heighten intentions to leave the military, though there is no significant effect of racially offensive behavior on the intended job change of active-duty personnel. Finally, our results point to the importance of accounting for unobserved individual- and job-specific heterogeneity when assessing the consequences of racial harassment. In particular, single-equation models result in estimated effects of racial harassment on job satisfaction and intended job change that are generally understated.

Keywords: Job Satisfaction, Racial Harassment, Quits, Military Employment

JEL Classification: J16, J28