Reporting Sexual Misconduct in the #MeToo Era

Ing-Haw Cheng (ing-haw.cheng@tuck.dartmouth.edu) and Alice Hsiaw
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Ing-Haw Cheng: Dartmouth College

No 129R, Working Papers from Brandeis University, Department of Economics and International Business School

Abstract: What deters individuals from reporting sexual misconduct, and what are the effects of #MeToo for reporting? We show that individuals under-report sexual misconduct if and only if a manager’s misconduct is widespread. The reason is that individuals face strategic uncertainty over whether others will also report misconduct and corroborate a pattern of behavior. We apply our model to study a manager’s decision to mentor subordinates, the coordinating effect of raising public awareness of misconduct, and the policy effects of confidential holding tanks for reports and rewards for whistleblow- ers. Overall, our study highlights several unintended and intended consequences of #MeToo.

Keywords: Misconduct; Reporting; Retaliation; Coordination (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 86 pages
Date: 2020-06, Revised 2020-08
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

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http://www.brandeis.edu/economics/RePEc/brd/doc/Brandeis_WP129R.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Reporting Sexual Misconduct in the #MeToo Era (2022)
Working Paper: Reporting Sexual Misconduct in the #MeToo Era (2020)
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