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Because accounting and law has an fairly even split between men and women then every other field (where physical differences don't come into play) "should" have similar representations too? Are male hairdressers trying twice as hard as their female counterparts to get to the same place? There is nothing about styling and cutting hair that should make it more appealing to women versus men. And yet we see huge imbalances there.

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> Because accounting and law has an fairly even split between men and women then every other field (where physical differences don't come into play) "should" have similar representations too?

No, but when fields that are very similar in terms of intellectual demands have dramatically different gender representations, there is reason to be suspicious about what is really driving the disparity.

A good example is teaching. There is no reason teaching should be more attractive to women than men, yet in the U.S. most teachers are women. But this disparity is entirely cultural--in some countries there is not only no stigma against male teachers, but a preference for them. Isn't it valid to ask why social structure is keeping men out of a solid, socially useful career?

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