They earn less for all sorts of reasons, including taking time out to have children, cutting back to part-time work when their kids are small, and the persistent 17% pay gap between male and female full-time workers.
But if you're much too young for that, you might yearn to scale back to part-time work, become your own boss or indulge yourself with a very long sabbatical.
Others are set back in their career paths, by taking less-demanding jobs, declining promotions or dropping back to part-time work with the arrival of a child.
A lenient landlord gives her extensions on her rent, which has allowed her to scale back to part-time work while she studies.
And because women, far more than men, scale back to part-time work or drop out of the paid labor force altogether to care for children or ill family members, we also need to expand Social Security benefits so the system recognizes the hard work and economic value provided by unpaid caregivers.
Although most women wanted to return to work as soon as possible, some were advised by the insurance physician to go back to part-time work sooner than they wanted.
Consider Barbara Petrucci, a dialysis nurse who had expected to stop working soon, or at least scale back to part time.
More typically, women who lead large companies, or head large corporate divisions, have husbands who have either retired outright or scale back to part-time or philanthropic work.
We found other women who tried to make work work by cutting back to part-time.
She cut back to part-time teaching.
Most interviewees hoped to "come back" step by step through part time work or some form of labour market practice.
