Poster Paper:
Earnings, Overtime, and Police Complaints
Saturday, November 5, 2016
Columbia Ballroom (Washington Hilton)
*Names in bold indicate Presenter
This research examines the relationship between earnings and complaints filed against Chicago Police Officers. More specifically, this paper looks at access to overtime hours - which we use to determine the opportunity for earning potential - following a complaint. This topic has several policy implications and potential interventions when trying to determine optimal police compensation. To make this assessment, we combine Chicago police officers' total earnings histories with a new dataset on police officers’ misconduct. We plan to estimate the magnitude and temporal pattern of complaints on police officers’ earnings, overtime work, and promotions. Using an event study approach, our preliminary results suggest that both overtime earnings and the likelihood to work over time increase pre-complaint, and drop immediately following a filed complaint. Finally, despite the drop in overtime, we also find that salary is not affected by the number of complaints.
