This from a woman's perspective.....

1) Most women opt for a backseat position careerwise to be able to combine home & hearth with job and not lose their sanity - this could be anything from a job that doesn't pay much to fewer hours to not using their full potential.

2) Inspite of the most supportive of husbands (& I picked David's post to respond to since he's obviously one of those exemplary ones) the reality is that women are better at multi-tasking so even if their work-schedules are as rigorous as their spouses' they still end up doing much much more - so for many of us almost the only workable option would be to take a week's break & attend classes - & of course since the week has to come out of your vacation time there's little to no motivation to actually doing this.

3) It's well known that in the IT world in particular, the only constant is change - at a pace so rapid that you constantly have to be playing catch-up - you come huffing and puffing & completely out of breath to what you think is the finish line only to discover that the line's already shifted further ahead. It's not a coincidence that women are a minority in the IT workforce - just get the ratio of male vs. female members on this site alone...

4) The reality is that it has become almost impossible to do justice to both career and family so one half (usually the husband) is picked for the role of "go out and get 'em" and the women get a job that'll still allow them to wear the other fun hats of chauffeur, cook, maid etc..

When I first came here I was thrilled about weekends - two whole days - what a luxury! Not anymore - I've come to dread weekends now - weekends mean that you catch up on all the chores you weren't able to do on the weekdays -

It really would be great if all those companies who tout mottos like "our employees are our best resources" actually put their money where their mouth is - whatever Joel's (on software) methods maybe for hiring developers no one would want to argue about being "treated like a star" - how many companies coddle their employees thus, leave alone give them the time of day ?!?!?!

If nothing else, companies should at the very least offer flex hours, telecommuting, vacation time that is not a joke (10 days a year ?!?!?!?!) etc.. that'll allow the employee to set his/her own schedule to upgrade some work-related stuff..at a pace that's much more doable & doesn't cost in terms of extra time, stress and juggling the eternal work-life balance...