13 By the early 1990s, the labor force participation rate of prime working-age women--those between the ages of 25 and 54--reached just over 74 percent, compared with roughly 93 percent for prime working-age men.
By then, the share of women going into the traditional fields of teaching, nursing, social work, and clerical work declined, and more women were becoming doctors, lawyers, managers, and, yes, professors. As women increased their education and joined industries and occupations formerly dominated by men, the gap in earnings between women and men began to close significantly.