Yet another report, this one from the Center for Work-Life Policy in New York, telling us something really rather different from what they think they’re telling us. This is like on, “Oh, gosh, there’s Sexism! Eeek!” report:

A time warp of 1970s sexist attitudes is driving women in their late thirties from careers in science and technology and undermining key sectors of the economy, according to an international study.

Researchers claim to have discovered a “hidden brain drain” as women opt out when facing a choice between family life and pushing for promotion at work.

The majority choose their children and alternative careers instead of struggling with the hurdles of a macho “lab coat culture” with long hours, old boys’ networks and the risk of sexual harassment.

Sylvia Ann Hewlett, an economist at the Center for Work-Life Policy in New York and the lead author of the study, said the research had revealed a world with values seemingly stuck in the 1970s.

She said: “It has been a bit like a time warp. This predatory or condescending culture [towards women] was more common across the workplace 20 to 30 years ago but has somehow survived in an engineering, science and technology context.

“It is the hidden brain drain. We have this amazing, talented pool of women who have left the industry. It is highly destructive to our society and economy.”

The thing is, they haven’t found some outpost of 1970s sexism, there’s nothing “macho” going on here (really, the geeks, macho? Sure you’re not all getting confused with the jocks there?). What they’ve found is that it is very difficult to balance both the climbing to the top of the career tree and having and raising children.

That’s it, tout court. One of their examples:

Nancy Lane, a cell biologist at Cambridge University, recalled the conflict she felt between work and her two children. “I felt forced to make agonising trade-offs, asking myself, ‘Do you abandon an experiment or abandon a needy child?’ ” she said. “I found myself deliberately choosing questions that allowed me to run experiments in a five-day week.”

See, it’s not the employers, it’s not the society, it’s not anything other than the intrinsic demands of doing science at the highest levels.

And women get a choice: do they want to pursue that science or are they more interested in other parts of life, like their children and their family? The absence of such a choice would be something to bemoan: but given that the choice exists, it seem very strange indeed to complain about the choices which are being taken.

Essentially, all that this research has uncovered is that women tend to carry the greatest burden of child care and that carrying this burden means that they might need to make compromises in other areas of life.

Wow! Surprising finding, eh? People have to make choices?