Examining the boundary conditions of tokenism: within-occupation gender wage gaps and female representation in the Canadian labor market

• Date: 11 January 2024
• Pages: 711-727
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/EDI-05-2023-0140
• Published date: 11 January 2024
• Author: Amber L. Stephenson,David B. Yerger

Examining the boundary

conditions of tokenism:

within-occupation gender wage

gaps and female representation in

the Canadian labor market

Amber L. Stephenson

David D. Reh School of Business, Clarkson University, Schenectady,

New York, USA, and

David B. Yerger

Eberly College of Business and Information Technology,

Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Indiana, Pennsylvania, USA

Abstract

Purpose –The purpose of this study was to examine the boundary conditions of Kanter’s (1977) tokenism

theory as applied to the gender wage gap. The authors aimed to discover if there was a point where the

relationship between the percentage of women in a job category and the gender wage gap changed, and, if so,

where the threshold was located and what was the nature of the shift in relationship.

Design/methodology/approach –The authors used the Andrews’(1993) threshold effects technique. Using

22 separate years of publicly available Canadian wage data, they examined the relationship between the

percentage of females in 40 unique occupational categories and the female-to-male earnings ratio (for a total of

880 observations).

Findings –The results showed the existence of a threshold point, and that early gains in percent female within

an occupation, up to approximately 14% female in the occupation, associatewith strong gains in the female-to-

male wage ratio. However, beyond that point, further gains in percent female associate with smaller

improvements in the female-to-male wage ratio.

Practical implications –The findings are useful in understanding the dynamics of occupational group

gender composition, potential theoretical reasons for the nuances in relationship, as well as opportunities that

may facilitate more equitable outcomes.

Originality/value –The results show that, though improvements were made above and below the threshold

point, enhancements in the wage gap are actually larger when there are less women in the job category (e.g.

tokens).

Keywords Tokenism, Gender wage gap, Threshold analysis, Proportion of women, Skewed groups

Paper type Research paper

More than 45 years ago, Kanter (1977) studied how the proportion of women in groups

influenced their experiences of inequity. Kanter (1977) identified four categories where the

experience of women changed. These categories were based on threshold ratios of dominant-

to-nondominant representation and include uniform groups (100:0), skewed groups (85:15),

tilted groups (65:35) and balanced groups (∼50:50; Joecks et al., 2013;Kanter, 1977). At the

heart of the contribution was the notion that disproportionate numbers are the cause of

negative effects experienced by women (Yoder, 1991). In particular, her assessment of skewed

groups, where women made up less than fifteen percent of the group (Yoder, 1991), suggested

that such a numerical advantage yielded influence and power for the men (Holgersson and

Romani, 2020). From this seminal work, tokenism theory emerged as a way to understand the

group interaction dynamics associated with underrepresentation of women (King et al., 2010).

Boundary

conditions of

tokenism

711

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:

https://www.emerald.com/insight/2040-7149.htm

Received 5 May 2023

Revised 19 October 2023

Accepted 14 December 2023

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion:

An International Journal

Vol. 43 No. 4, 2024

pp. 711-727

© Emerald Publishing Limited

2040-7149

DOI 10.1108/EDI-05-2023-0140

Since that time, the notion of tokenism and the underrepresentation of women more

broadly conceived has been adopted as one of the foremost explanations of gender inequity in

the workplace. It should be noted that men can also occupy token status in the workplace.

However, research has shown that male tokens have divergent experiences than female

tokens because of the higher social status position held by males (Heikes, 1991) and can even

benefit from the enhanced assumption of leadership as well as positive differential treatment

(Simpson, 2004). Consequently, researchers have executed painstaking examinations of the

proportion of women in leadership roles (McKinsey, 2022) and how such representation

affects organizational outcomes. For instance, scholars have explored how overall

representation of women in the workplace improves performance (Rodr



ıguez-Ruiz et al.,

2016), as well as how representation of women on corporate boards yields innovation

(Torchia et al., 2011), improved performance (Campopiano et al., 2022;Joecks et al., 2013;

Konrad et al., 2008;Wiley and Monllor-Tormos, 2018) and executive compensation (Cook

et al., 2019). Scholars have also focused on how the proportion of female managers influences

the number of jobs filled by women (Cohen and Broschak, 2013), gender integration (Huffman

et al., 2010) and wage inequality, though with mixed results (Cohen and Huffman, 2007;Hultin

and Szulkin, 1999;Srivastava and Sherman, 2015). Overall, with few exceptions, this

empirical work appears to imply that having more women in a job category or occupational

role should yield positive outcomes. This is a reasonable assumption because, according to

Kanter (1977), when a group reaches the point of balanced representation, dynamics equalize

as sex is no longer a salient category for comparison. It can be interpreted as the place where

biases may dissipate.

However, despite this ample body of research, there is far less scholarship that examines

the specific tipping point or threshold where the nature of the relationship changes between

the proportion of women and specific outcomes of interest, such as the wage gap.

Consequently, information about the nature of the wage gap relationship above and below

critical points of representation of women in the job category is woefully underexamined.

Intrinsic to the theory, when the underrepresented group achieves a certain threshold, or

critical mass, the degree of influence over the group changes (Torchia et al., 2011). It is

therefore reasonable to conjecture that there may be a clear point within the data where the

relationship notably shifts and that the nature of the relationship may differ above and below

the threshold point.

The purpose of this article is to reexamine the boundary c onditions of Kanter’s (1977)

tokenism theoryas it pertains to the gender wage gap. We do this by testingthe relationship

between percent of women in the job category and the wage gap using Andrews (1993)

thresholdtechnique which objectivelydetermines whethera breakpoint existsand, if so, where

the criticalmass resides. Theempirical results in thisarticle reveal that thewage gap appears to

close more quickly where the proportion of womenis less in the category. Thefindings of our

study have implications for human resource managers, policymakers, scholars and

organizational leaders who endeavor to understandand create a culture of pay parity.

The paper is organized in the following manner: we begin by describing previous work on

the wage gap and theoretical background for the study. We then describe the threshold

methodology employed to determine the critical point where the relationship changes in the

data. Finally, we present the results followed by a discussion of the implications for our

findings.

Literature review

The wage gap

The gender wage gap has been the target of intense investigation over the past half century

and remains an area of innovative scholarship. The trend over several decades has shown

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