Does the Love of Money Moderate the Relationship between Public Service Motivation and Job Satisfaction? The Case of Chinese Professionals in the Public Sector

Abstract

To what extent do attitudes toward money – specifically, the love of money – moderate the relationship between public service motivation and job satisfaction among public sector professionals in China? The authors collected data from full-time public sector professionals who also were part-time students in a master of public administration program in eastern China. After confirmatory factor analyses, the regression results show that a public servant’s love of money moderates the relationship between public service motivation and job satisfaction – that is, individuals with a strong love of money have a significantly stronger relationship between public service motivation and job satisfaction than those without, a finding that supports the “crowding-in effect”. Alternatively, for high love-of-money civil servants with a "steel rice bowl" mentality, high job satisfaction is explained by the best offer (output) for the minimum amount of effort (input), at least within Chinese culture. Such findings are counterintuitive in light of Chinese personal values, equity theory, public servants’ institutional background, ethical organizational culture, and corruption.