이타심 혹은 공정성: 청년층의 사회적 선호와 공공부문 직업선택에 관한 연구

Scholars in public administration have not paid much attention to various types of social preferences as job motivation, with existing studies tending to heavily focus on public service motivation (PSM). To make matters worse, although the two concepts are different, social preferences and PSM are used interchangeably in many studies. By focusing on the concept of social preferences, therefore, this study tries to answer the question of whether individuals’ social preferences, specifically altruism and fairness, affect their choice to work in the public sector. To measure altruism and fairness, hypothetical dictator and ultimatum games were respectively used. Empirical results based on a binary logit analysis reveal that individuals with a higher preference for fairness are more likely to work in the public sector, but it is marginally significant at the 10% level. Meanwhile, altruism is not statistically significant. These results imply that social preferences may not be a strong motivation to choose the public sector in Korea. Young job seekers are more attracted to the public sector because of realistic concerns, such as life-long job security or fringe benefits.