Why do you leave a lot of workforce women

It is a blatant number: 212,000. This is the number of women between the ages of twenty or more of the workforce has left since January, according to the latest number of jobs issued on August 1 by the Labor Statistics Office. (On the contrary, 44,000 men have entered the workforce since January.) The numbers show a reflection of modern trends that have seen more women, especially women who have children, and find full -time jobs.

The data indicates that between January and June, Misty Lee Hegness, an associate professor of economics and public affairs at Kansas University, says that the workforce rate is between the ages of 25 and 44 years of age with a child less than five percentage points, from 69.7 % to 66.9 %. It is a great reflection. The participation of these women increased in 2022, 2023 and 2024, reaching its peak in January 2025, when flexible work policies helped women join the workforce and generate income that affects their need for their families.

The workers have witnessed the flexibility that was abolished in 2025 on a large scale. President Donald Trump ordered federal employees Back to the office Five days a week in January, although many have negotiated the work arrangements, some have even moved away from their offices. Amazonand Jp MorganAnd AT & T It also returned to five days a week in 2025. Overall, the office’s requirements fully jumped between 500 Fortune to 24 % in the second quarter of 2025, up from 13 % at the end of 2024, according to Flex indexThat tracks work policies remotely.

This women were struck with a Bachelor’s degree in particular; The average participation rate, which was decreasing for decades before the epidemic, began to climb again in 2020, with a peak of 70.3 % in September 2024. It has decreased since then, and reached 67.7 % in July 2025, according to the last job report.

Read more: When people return to the offices, he returns to misery for America working in America

Julie Vogtutman, director of job quality at the National Women’s Center, says it is not a coincidence that women’s participation in the workforce disappear. Women have benefited from remote work and flexibility during the epidemic and stopped leaving the workforce, Research shows. Now, many are unable to do this.

“The woman still holds the lion’s share of the responsibilities of providing care, and they are more likely than men to move on how to meet these care responsibilities while keeping a job,” she says. “They are also more likely than men to feel that they should leave the workforce when the budget action becomes unnecessary.”

Return policies have not proven that companies make companies more productive. one 2024 studies The CVs in Microsoft, Spacex and Apple found that the policies of returning to the office have led to the migration of senior employees, which pose a potential threat to competitiveness of the largest company. Nearly two-thirds of the C-SUITE executives said that the return to work caused a “non-proportional number” of females, according to Walr’s 2024 survey, which is the data collection agency, on behalf of work and intelligence in the workplace. Many of these executives who reported women said that they are fighting to fill in jobs due to the loss of female female employees and that their general production in the workforce has decreased.

“When I hear about these companies that make everyone return to the office, the most natural situation is that it is required by a person of old males with what I call the care concession, and it is that they have someone who cooks their meals, the ironing of their clothes, or picks up their children from daytime care.”

Read more: Trump’s batch to the office is a mistake

The disappearance of flexibility is not the only reason for working women’s workforce in 2025. Some decrease in participation comes from low -income women in jobs that had to be done historically full -time, even during the epidemic. These women are struggling because the federal dollars in child care decreased dramatically in 2025. These funds have helped many centers to stay open and ship low tuition fees than they were. This financing is over In September 2024, many centers were forced to close or raise tuition fees, leaving some families without options.

Moreover, the mass deportation processes that occur throughout the country now affect children’s care providers, about 20 % of them immigrants, according to Fougman. Even if workers have a legal status, some may be afraid of attending work, and others may have lost their children and they must stay at home as a result, she says. Federal financing helped some service providers prevent their costs; Now, childcare expenses rise again. The amount of money spent by American families decreased on the nursery, primary and secondary schools mostly from 2023 and 2024, then began to rise again in the fourth quarter of 2024, when 3.3 % jumped, according to Economic Analysis Office. Every quarter rose in 2025 ..

“You have a population of working women who find it difficult to work increasingly in mathematics,” says Vogtuman.

They include many federal government workers, who may have been attracted to their jobs because government jobs were considered a long time ago, with good benefits such as parental leave, says Heggenes. research Suggest It says women are likely to take a low -wage function if there are benefits such as remote work and flexibility around the timing of their schedule. If these functions, they are a tremendous layoffs experience – and federal workers under the reduction of Trump’s size – can be affected by an impartial manner.

With women leaving the workforce, the Trump administration explores ways to encourage women to marry You have more children In order to slow down the country’s decrease in the birth rate. But Heggeness suspects that forcing federal government workers to return to the office makes many women choose between having children and following their career – and many may choose the latter.

“What they are doing now, with the policies of returning to work and leading them with role models, says, is the opposite of what you want to do from the policy perspective if you really care about increasing birth rates,” says Heggeness.

Of course, for some women, leaving the workforce can be a blessing, if their partners have stable jobs that provide good income. They have more time to spend with their families, some are independent or The start of their own business.

Sarah Widj moved from Philadelphia during the epidemic. She says that her work ended when her company contacted the employees to the office, and decided that she did not want to return to her family. Now, she is independent and spends more time with her three -year -old daughter. “I am my mother, and this is part of the reason that I enjoyed free movement, it is the entire liquid schedule, which is great,” she says.

But there are reasons for worrying about leaving the workforce. Without salaries, many families struggle to bear the basics such as housing, food and transportation; They have less money for spending, which means a decrease in economy. Their health care and other benefits are more dangerous in the economy in which only one partner works. Economic growth Slow In the first half of the year; In the long run, slowing growth exacerbates the standard of living of people.

For many women, this is more than just an economic problem: it is a frustrating reminder that the short period of time that work dominates from home-when the family balance and sometimes work at times.

Read more: The flexible employers were grapes

The big picture, the participation of the women’s workforce in the United States has stopped in recent decades, as it reached its climax in the early first decade of the twentieth century, even with its rise in many countries in Europe. But then, during the epidemic, the prices began to rise again, as a woman can handle the receipt of children’s care and other care responsibilities while working from home. Among married women, rates increased from 56.9 % in January 2021 to 59 % in January 2024.

“What distinguishes the most tragic about all of this is that the epidemic felt such a revolution, as they finally realized that we are human beings and they will treat us with a degree of respect,” she says, which means that she is still able to work full time. And she says: “In the epidemic, they used to say:” We care about you as people, and we understand that your well -being contributes to your productivity at work. ”

The mother, who does not want to use her name because she does not want to risk her far place, has two young children and she moved to be closer to their ancestors during the epidemic. Now, she is just waiting for her company to finish her work by reversing her remote work situation, which the company says can be canceled at any time for any reason. She is not ready to capture her family and return, but she hopes she will not have to choose.