“Women also were dispro portionately affected by about 800,000 government job cuts from 2010 to 2013, and only a small portion of those have come back, says Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Analytics.

And while women have benefited from consistent growth in health care, hiring in the sector slowed late last year as the Affordable Care Act led to a new emphasis on efficiency, says Heidi Hartmann, president of the Institute for Women’s Policy Research.

Some women a re dropping out of the labor force. A BLS report last week showed that 22% of women laid off from jobs they held at least three years in 2012 and 2013 stopped working or looking for work by this past January, vs. 14% of men.”