Government employees are less likely than most of their private sector counterparts to say their organizations are highly ethical, according to a new study.
Of nine industry sectors surveyed in the 1999 National Business Ethics Study, government ranked eighth in terms of how its own employees rated its commitment to ethics. Government organizations at the federal, state and local levels ranked behind the financial services, technology, insurance, health services, retail, communications and manufacturing industries. Only the transportation industry ranked below government. The study was conducted by the Hudson Institute and Walker Information, two Indianapolis, Ind.-based research groups.
"Government is in a difficult position because it regulates ethical business practices, but according to government employees, there are many integrity problems in-house," the study said.
One in four government workers surveyed said they doubted that their senior leaders "are people of high integrity." About three in four said they were not comfortable reporting misconduct. Thirty percent of government workers said they did not believe ethics complaints were handled well.
The survey was conducted this spring and included the responses of 2,293 U.S. workers across the nine industry sectors.
A similar survey released last year by Walker Information found that government workers were the most likely of any industry's employees to say they were aware of ethical violations at work. The reason government workers are more likely to spot ethics problems is because their training on ethics is better than in most other industries, said Walker Information chairman Frank Walker.
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