There may be some truth to that, but I think it is more complicated than that.<p>In the US, women who are childless and unmarried make about 98% as much as men with similar education and experience.  Women who are married and/or have kids make, on average, about 2/3 what men make which means men make about 50% more than women make.  About 90% of women have kids, sooner or later.  Those who don't, are likely to adopt.  When a man moves, it is usually because he got a job elsewhere.  When a woman moves, it is often to follow her spouse or boyfriend to his new job.  This means when a given couple move, he is probably taking a step up in his career and she is very likely taking a step down.  Given that women are much more likely than men to stay home with the kids for a time or otherwise take time off from work to attend to the children, for most women it makes sense to favor supporting his career goals over hers.<p>Additionally, most jobs and education are geared towards a schedule that works well for your typical white american male with his own car and with a woman attending to details like grocery shopping so he can focus on his job/education.  This hurts not only women but minorities who have fewer resources and/or a different lifestyle/different values and cannot readily conform to such expectations.  Benefits also tend to line up with the expectation that you can work full time for a number of years at it.  So a woman who works part-time (even 30 hours a week) at the same company for 20 years will have nowhere near the resources that someone working full-time would have.  She is not likely to get tenure, she may not qualify at all for many of the benefits programs, etc.<p>Additionally, studies show that male traits, like being tall or having a deep voice, are generally viewed as "authoritative".  This can be an insurmountable obstacle.  For example, high heels may make a woman appear taller but they are not generally associated with being in charge.  They are more likely to be interpreted as "sexy" rather than "authoritative".<p>My personal experience has been that behavior which is viewed as normal and acceptable in men is often interpreted as extremely aggressive in a woman and is socially censured.  The fact that I tend to sit up front in classes or large meetings often gets noticed by other people and seems to be viewed as "aggressive".  The truth is, I do so for reasons like:  I don't see that well and I have some hearing problems.  Other people don't necessarily know that and seem to assume I'm some brass balls bitch....or some such. Even if they did know it, I don't know that it would be viewed as more acceptable.  The last week of GIS school, I realized that most women consistently sat in the back two rows of class.  Given the amount of negative attention I get for doing "aggressive" things like sitting up front, I really can't blame other women for avoiding such behaviors. &#60;shrug&#62;