mjglqw, the reports of such sites actually make a big difference because they become blocked in Chrome Firefox, but also some popular security software is using the same data for they antifraud/phishing protection modules. So if many people report some site this will turn red light on Google's side, and they will block it very quickly.
For example, this is what users of Chrome see when they access blocked site :

Enough warning for most, though some even ignore it and choose to open the page (which is possible). Still, I think most think it's not their problem, even a few seconds is
waste of time, but that's wrong thinking. Today you save someone, the next day that person can save you.
For those who want practice reports of bad sites, here is few of them :
[Warning]Phising Cryptocurrency Website