John has it right.

In my experience having worked for a dozen or so organizations, when they hire people they look for job skills, compatible temperament with the organization, and likelihood of retention.

Most women hired stayed for a relatively short duration due primarily to husbands' job change and secondarily because of pregnancy (priority of being a "mom"). These are facts of life in this culture; it is not bias against women. Employers value the ability to retain workers. It costs lots of money to hire and train employees.

When women go in and out of the work force because of changing lifestyle conditions, there is additional training required - even when they have college educations. Every employer and position has different needs.

It is too simplistic to have "equal pay for equal work" be the sole criteria because there are several other characteristics that are valuable to employers, like consistency and likelihood of being around awhile. Women aren't as likely to stick around as long and as consistently as men in this culture.

So, with a little social engineering that the dems would like to do, this too can change. Men, man your aprons!