I know I’m heading into some sticky terrain with this, but lately I’ve been wondering if indeed women wouldn’t be better off if they had something equivalent to a “Red Tent” during those premenstrual days.

Many professional women I talk to say it’s definitely harder for them to be productive right before their periods, and so many men tend to blame a woman’s bad mood and other negative behaviors on her period.

I was joking around with a friend of mine recently that women should be given a day off each month to deal with PMS.

I was only kidding folks. For the most part, women are very productive even if they have PMS. Yes, women can run companies and even this nation during this time. I just want to make that clear. Many women believe we shouldn’t even be discussing this as a problem publicly because it’s one of many reasons women still don’t get respect in the workplace. What are your thoughts on this? Just suggesting that I wanted to write this blog post made many of my female colleagues uncomfortable.

But there is something to PMS impacting our work lives. The questions are — Is it real or perceived? How bad can it get?

I asked PMS expert Diana Taylor for her take.

Taylor is professor emerita at the School of Nursing at the University of California, San Francisco, and she’s also the author of “Taking Back the Month: A Personalized Solution for Managing PMS and Enhancing Your Health.”

“Not everything can be attributed to PMS…stress plays a major role in work-related problems. However, our stress response can be accelerated during the “premenstrual days,” she says.

It’s hard to know which came first, the chicken or the egg when it comes to PMS.

“In one study, about 15 percent of the women reported that relationship problems at work—such as increased conflicts, criticism, complaints, and rejection—increased the severity of their PMS. These findings were confirmed in my own research. It’s not just the communication problems with individual coworkers that are stressful to women with PMS. Often, the overall work environment can place an added strain on women during the premenstrual phase. Women with PMS often report being more sensitive to noise, temperature changes, odors, and non-verbal tension among coworkers or work groups. Conflicting demands from various managers or supervisors or a lack of control over how the work is performed can also be especially tough to take premenstrually. Not surprisingly, women often report increased stress due to excessive workloads or insufficient time to complete their work during this already difficult time in their menstrual cycles.”

So is it all in our heads, I asked her.

“There does seem to be some evidence for what we call the expectation-experience link which can create a perpetuating cycle: While women may come to expect premenstrual symptoms for a variety of reasons, their actual experience of symptoms can also come to influence their expectations. In other words, women who have premenstrual symptoms may come to anticipate their arrival each month and, hence, may perceive events around the time of menstruation as more stressful. And this heightened perception of stress may wind up exacerbating their symptoms and so on.”

She believes we need start thinking of women’s cycles in a much more positive light, and in turn that may diminish some of the negative feelings we associate with PMS. But good luck with that one. I think many of us women have gotten used to bitching about that time of the month. No?

If there is something to the claims that PMS does indeed impact our lives/work, what can be done about it on the part of women, employers?

“Women can read my book and incorporate the remedies which include easy to integrate strategies into busy lives. As for employers, both men and women workers would benefit from stress management strategies. At least the menstrual cycle is predictable…men don’t have the same predictable period of stress vulnerability. For women, tracking their stressful days whether it be premenstrual or on the weekend when they have additional domestic burdens. Rather than focusing only on the women, employers would be better off using some to the cognitive-behavioral stress reduction strategies for all their workers (and themselves).”

And what about a day off?

“Some women may want to disappear into the modern version of the ‘menstrual hut’ each month,” she explains. But, if you can’t build that hut, she adds, women can help themselves by managing their time better and anticipating the worst of PMS. And that means avoiding or postponing stressful events.

Oh, if it were only that easy.

When I was pregnant with my daughter many years ago, I was working for the worse boss I had ever had. He was vindictive, passive aggressive, and afraid of his own shadow — all the key characteristics you don’t want in a boss.

I loved what I was doing, but this guy made my life hell. Many nights were lost to bitching about this manager and at some point my husband and I decided I needed to make a change.

My ultimate goal had always been to write a book or two, and try my hand at freelancing and becoming my own boss, but it was always not the right time to take the plunge. Well, we decided to save my whole paycheck for the nine months I was pregnant and then consider whether I could actually start life as a freelancer once my daughter was born. The jerky boss was a great motivator for finally pushing my fears aside.

We ended up saving enough money that after my six-week maternity leave I made the happy walk into my boss’ office.

I told him I was not coming back to my job because I wanted to become a freelancer and take time to write my first book.

His response: “oh, I know, once women become moms the pull of the child is just too strong.”

I tried to reiterate that I was quitting to embark on a new career path for myself, but he kept doing the wink and nod, as if I was just kidding about my new direction.

I sat there thinking, should I tell this guy — “you’re a prick. That’s why I’m out of here bozo”?

But I restrained myself, opting to do the right thing for the sake of my future in journalism and for the sake of our civil society.

Women do not leave a job they love, that pays them a good wage and fulfills them just because the call of motherhood is tugging at them. I don’t care what Dr. Laura says.

They leave because they don’t like their job, or because their bosses suck, or because the opportunities suck, or because the pay sucks.

The latter, it turns out, is one of the biggest reasons, according to a new study to be released today.

The New York Times broke the story this morning about a Congressional study and research by economists that shows women are leaving the workplace in higher numbers because of the tough economy and it’s not for the reasons everyone has assumed.

Indeed, for the first time since the women’s movement came to life, an economic recovery has come and gone, and the percentage of women at work has fallen, not risen, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports. Each of the seven previous recoveries since 1960 ended with a greater percentage of women at work than when it began.

When economists first started noticing this trend two or three years ago, many suggested that the pullback from paid employment was a matter of the women themselves deciding to stay home — to raise children or because their husbands were doing well or because, more than men, they felt committed to running their households.

It’s the money stupid.

After moving into virtually every occupation, women are being afflicted on a large scale by the same troubles as men: downturns, layoffs, outsourcing, stagnant wages or the discouraging prospect of an outright pay cut. And they are responding as men have, by dropping out or disappearing for a while.

“When we saw women starting to drop out in the early part of this decade, we thought it was the motherhood movement, women staying home to raise their kids,” Heather Boushey, a senior economist at the Joint Economic Committee of Congress, which did the Congressional study, said in an interview. “We did not think it was the economy, but when we looked into it, we realized that it was.”

I have long talked about how a good job, with bosses who are understanding of family issues, with opportunities for advancement, and that pays a fair wage, are the kinds of jobs most people don’t just check out of. You don’t need an HR experts to explain why there is low turnover in gigs like this.

Women are done a disservice if we all just assume they are leaving the workplace because they have a child. It’s clearly not the case for most women. Saying it diminishes the importance of changing the major negatives in today’s workplace — a growing disparity in pay among the rank and file and top executives, and the inflexibility when it comes to work-life balance.

And the occasional pricky boss of course.

So there I was sitting with two happy couples for a taping of the the Donny Deutsch show, “The Big Idea”, on CNBC that airs tonight.

I mention that these couples are happy because it’s surprising that they are.

Why? They’re not only married, they are also business partners. I know what you’re thinking - because everyone thinks this – how the hell are they able to be partners in love and in business?

Well, these entrepreneurs are the oddballs. And I said that on the show. (Yes, I’ll be on the show tonight; that is, if the editors don’t cut me out. Which is possible, so don’t be disappointed if you stay up until 10 p.m.. EST and CareerDiva isn’t there.)

I was on the show to offer my counter view to their success.

Maybe some of you couples out are considering going into business with your spouse because the economy is tough right now and you may end up on the corporate trash heap. But think long and hard folks before you share your bed and your company with one person.

Here are the five things that can go wrong:
1. Marriage and business both go belly up. You could end up losing your marriage and business because many marriages just can’t take major financial upheaval, which is what happens when starting any business.
2. Kiss romance goodbye. Many couples say they get sick of being together day in and day out. Even the most lovie-dovie couples need some time alone in order to keep the passion burning.
3. Dining room becomes the boardroom. The lines between homelife and worklife are blurred. There is no way around it, you’re going to be bringing your company woes home with you and vice versa. Right now, when I’m bitching too much about my business, my husband slaps me around and reminds me I need a personal life. Who will be there to slap you around if your partner is also bitching about the same company?
4. “I can’t believe you said that.” Talk about hurt feelings! Try telling your spouse they screwed up, or made a wrong business decision.
5. Battle of the sexes. If you never resolved the who’s-the-boss issue at home get ready for all out war at work. One of the reasons my mom and dad couldn’t make a go of running a business together was because my father saw himself as the king of his household, and that translated into him being the king of the business, even when my mom had good ideas because she really was the one who understood the retail business they started. Now my mother’s advice is always, “never with your husband.”

If you watch the show tonight you’ll hear some of how the couples that made a go at partnership made it work. They were the two cutest couples, totally friends, lovers and great business partners. Cricket and Brian Allen, the owners of Bot, a fortified water business. And Sandra and Kym Yancey, owners of eWomen Network, a national networking website.

But again, these are the oddballs.

Here’s a good example of why Cricket and Brian are successful at melding love and company:

I was in the Green room waiting to go on the show, and just before we went into the studio Cricket turned to Brian and said, “did you eat your sandwich?” He turned to her with a genuine smile on his face and yes, “yes, I did.” He was so grateful his wife was thinking of him.

OK, if I did that to my husband, this would be his response: “I’m not Cheiron.” Cheiron is my six-year-old son.

Do you see my point? If not, I will explain it to you. When two partners work together to make a business grow they have to say mean things, critical things to each other often. They can’t take things personally and they have to look at the criticism or advice as constructive and for the good of the business.

Most couples get emotional with each other. That’s not a bad thing. It’s just reality.

You have to leave you emotions and the constant business talk at the company door, don’t take it to work and don’t replay it at home.

Can you do that with your spouse? When’s the last time you guys had an argument? What was it about? Imagine now that you were really angry at your spouse but when the alarm went off in the morning you had to head to an office or factory together and focus on working together in harmony all day.

If this doesn’t worry you, go ahead. Start a mom and pop. I dare you.

There are lots of women studying to become doctors. And tons wanting to be lawyers. But, for some reason, women are not breaking down the doors of MBA programs dying to enroll.

Based on recent data, women made up nearly 50 percent of enrollment at law and medical schools, but only 27 percent of the pie in MBA programs.

Now, I want to preface this whole blog post by saying I’m not advocating women run out and get MBAs. I have written in the past about how an MBA isn’t always a guaranteed ticket to career success. But I think it is curious that more women are not pursuing this higher business degree, and in turn not ending up in the upper echelon of the business world, or the corporate world for that matter.

So what the heck is going on? Why aren’t more women pursuing an MBA?

I spoke with Elissa Ellis Sangster, executive director of the Forté Foundation, a group that promotes MBA and other forms of business education for women, and she had an earful to say about the matter.

“Young women really don’t understand what options there are in business,” she explains. It’s not all about Wall Street, she says, there are tons of options for savvy women who hold an MBA in their hands, everything from working for non profits to entrepreneurship.

The people in women’s “influencer set” - including family, friends, career counselors - tend not to steer females toward business, especially women who are initially all about liberal arts in college.

“For women,” she adds, “there’s a disconnect between the nurture idea and wanting to do something good, and the message they get from business. They see negative imagery out there. They see it as not contributing to society.”

HELLO GALS OUT THERE!!

Is anyone paying attention to the news? There’s a mortgage crisis going on in this country that was perpetuated by people in the business world, Wall Streeters and bankers, and, they were mainly men at the helm of this. I’m not bashing men here, it’s just the reality of who runs these organizations.

Tell me this mortgage mess has not impacted society profoundly.

OK, sorry, got off track a bit. Back to Ellis Sangster.

While she says an MBA or a career in business isn’t all about money, it is also all about money.

And what’s wrong with that? Money isn’t dirty. It can be used for great good if we want it to. But we won’t have any say in it being used for great good if we’re not in the business driver’s seat with men.

How come we think it’s odd for women to want money or to have control over money? This goes to the heart of why women are still making 75 cents on the dollar compared to men and why our numbers are dwindling in the corner office.

Look, an MBA is no guarantee that you’ll make it to the top, and Ellis Sangster agrees with that, but it will give you a boost of confidence in the workplace and it will shut up some of those lunkheads in the business world that already think you have a strike against you because you don’t have a penis.

I don’t want to sound cynical here, but there still is bias in the workplace and every female executive I’ve interviewed has experienced it. When you walk in the door of a new organization or a new division, an MBA will definitely give you that little boost of credibility because naysayers will at least know you committed yourself in some way to the business cause.

To help women think a bit harder about MBAs and business, the Forte Foundation holds forums with successful female MBA holders around the country, and they’ve also started going to campuses to talk to young girls about careers in business.

Parents also need to get involved and talk to their daughters about all types of careers without excluding the potential of a job in business, advises Ellis Sangster.

Interestingly enough, she often gets calls from dads wanting information on how their daughters can pursue an MBA. But the moms never call, she says.

Man, we have a long way to go.

Workers in the private sector should be crossing their fingers right about now. A bill just passed in the House to give federal employees four weeks off paid when they have a child or adopt.

The bill was introduced by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), Steny H. Hoyer (D-MD), and Tom Davis (R-VA), and it now goes to the Senate where Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.), much talked about as a possible running mate for Obama, is sponsoring the bill.

If enacted it could become a template for the nation’s workforce at large.

“The federal government may refer to its leave policies as ‘family-friendly,’ but the reality is that it’s forcing many of its employees to choose between their paycheck and their new child,” says Rep. Maloney. “As the nation’s largest employer, the federal government should be setting a national standard with workplace policies that are truly family-friendly. If President Bush supports family values, he will reevaluate his misguided veto threat of this important legislation.”

I’ve written about the paid family leave debate going on right now in this country. As you can imagine, many businesses are fighting these proposals because they fear it will impact there businesses negatively.

I’m admittedly torn about this issue. Paid leave would be a great benefit for workers who are struggling to care for family and stay productive at work. But businesses, small firms in particular, could find themselves short handed when workers take advantage of what could be a future perk. I write about this conflict today in my MSNBC.com smallbiz blog.

Unfortunately, the realities of life come and bite us on the ass too often. Where family is concerned, we have to give all our priorities. I’m not talking about being there for a soccer game, or having tea with a parent. I’m talking about needing time to care for a loved one who’s sick, or who has just come into the world.

Too many workers don’t have the luxury of taking time off unpaid, or quitting their jobs to become stay-at-home parents. Some workers would face financial ruin at a time when they need to be strong and help a family member.

There’s this insane idea that women can do it all on their own.

You know what I’m talking about moms out there. You keep piling on the responsibilities at work and at home and then you wonder what the “F” is going on.

Recently a friend of mine lost it because she was so overwhelmed.

Why? Because she got home from work and no one had picked up groceries. It doesn’t seem like a tragedy? BUT IT WAS DAMN IT! That’s the whole point. Women do too much and we suck at expecting others to help out. Since she usually does most of the things around the house, plus work like a dog at her career, they expected her to do it all.

A study I recently came across shows how much we suck at this.

The survey, by staffing company Adecco USA, asked working parents a host of work-life balance questions, and I was shocked to see that men expect their firms to be doing more to help them achieve that balance. Fifty five percent of the dads polled said they thought their firms could be doing more, compared to 49 percent of moms. And 45 percent of fathers thought becoming a parent impacted there careers, versus 41 percent of mothers who thought so.

For both these questions I would have expected closer to 100 percent of working moms to answer “yes, yes, yes”.

Come on gals out there. We have to stop thinking, without us the world will stop spinning. How come moms everywhere aren’t ranting and raving about how today’s workplace does not accommodate working parents? And hello!!!! Every woman I speak with knows becoming a mom did a number on their careers in some way.

But here we are telling a pollster that it’s not that bad.

“The perception that the work/life balancing act is mainly a female struggle no longer holds up in today’s workplace,” says Rich Thompson, Vice President of Training & Development for Adecco Group North America.

Sorry Rich. I agree that men are picking up more of the slack, but alas, it still is largely a “female struggle.”

But what I find most disturbing about this survey is that women don’t expect more, not just at home, but of their employers. Maybe that’s why work-life balance perks have not become widespread in the work world, because the people that need them the most aren’t outraged or demanding enough. Maybe it will take more men struggling with this balancing act to finally transform the workplace.

I’m having one of those mornings when little makes sense.

At a time when companies are cutting back on leave for working parents and a growing number of Americans are losing their jobs, why would intelligent men and women agree to give CEOs of major companies money after their dead.

The men and women I’m talking about are the board members of large corporations that approved so-called death benefits for top executives. The Wall Street Journal found these lavish payouts after reviewing federal filings and reported on these shocking perks yesterday.

You still can’t take it with you. But some executives have arranged for the next best thing: huge corporate payouts to their heirs if they die in office.

Take Eugene Isenberg, the 78-year-old chief executive of Nabors Industries Ltd. If Mr. Isenberg died tomorrow, Nabors would owe his estate a “severance” payment of at least $263.6 million, company filings show. That’s more than the first-quarter earnings at the Houston oil-service company.

These payouts are known as “golden coffins” and they really make you wonder whether “supply side economics” really does lift all boats.

Lately it seems the average worker is sinking when you look at stagnant wage increases among the rank and file, and continued reductions in benefits, everything from healthcare to time off.

Employees are paying more than ever for the health insurance they get from their employers, if they get any coverage at all. And paid leave benefits are few and far between. Indeed, a story in today’s Wall Street Journal talks about how maternity leave is the latest benefit to be hacked and slashed in the workplace.

At a time when many consumers are scrambling for cash, working parents face an added source of pressure: a squeeze on maternity-leave pay and time off.

Employers are cutting back on post-childbirth pay for mothers and offering shorter leaves, on average, for both moms and dads, compared with a decade ago. This comes despite research showing attentive nurturing has particular developmental power in a baby’s first year, and that longer leaves can ease postpartum depression in some mothers. The pattern heightens the need for parents to plan carefully for time off post-childbirth.

Unfortunately, if your employer doesn’t give you some paid time off to have a baby or care for a sick relative you’re on your own. The United States is one of only a few industrialized nations that does not mandate paid family leave. The other nations that join us in this distinction include Liberia, Papua New Guinea and Swaziland.

So, instead of just ranting about the lack of fairness in today’s workplace, there are things we can do if we’re employees that need help when it comes to caring for loved ones, or when we lose our jobs.

Three states, including California, New Jersey and Washington, now have paid-family- leave legislation on the books, and a host of other states are considering it. Also, federal bills are circulating right now that call for varying amounts of leave. I wrote a story about this recently for MSNBC.com. Workers who want to see this mandated should call their local and state representatives and tell them they want to see this become the law of the land.

And right now, the House Democrats are on the verge of presenting a bill to extend umemployment benefits for workers who have lost their jobs in this tough economy. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer from Maryland is pushing this extension so get on the horn to your Congressmen and women if you think this is a good idea.

Even if you think government should stay out of the mandating business and let the economic engine take care of itself, you should make your voices heard.

While I can’t help but think such benefits will really help lift all boats down the line, we always need healthy discourse in order to make the best decisions.

I’m sure the board members locked in those wood-paneled rooms at corporations deciding whether to pay out millions to dead executives missed out on healthy discourse.

Let’s just hope they don’t decide to bury some workers with the dead CEOs to accompany them into the after worklife.

Hillary Clinton brought up a great point this week on the campaign trail. She believes the media has ignored sexism against her campaign but have played up racism against Barack Obama.

It got me thinking about attitudes in the workplace. I’ve been writing about discrimination at work for many years, and it does seem sexist remarks don’t seem to carry the same weight as racist remarks among some individuals.

People seem to get more outraged when someone attacks a coworker for the color of their skin than their gender. I’m not basing this on scientific evidence, it is just what I’ve seen as an employee and in the stories workers have shared with me.

Here’s what Clinton had to say in a Washington Post article this week:

“There should be equal treatment of the sexism and the racism when it raises its ugly head. It does seem as though the press at least is not as bothered by the incredible vitriol that has been engendered by the comments by people who are nothing but misogynists.”

Geraldine Ferraro, a Clinton supporter, recently made an interesting point. She was referring to the “Iron My Shirt” t-shirt that an idiot displayed at a Clinton rally:

“Suppose somebody at that Barack Obama rally said ‘Shine my shoes,’” Ferraro said. “The person would have been swamped by the media saying, ‘what, are you a racist?’ Hillary barely saw press on this. It is not only the Obama campaign. It is how the press has handled this.”

I have to take issue with Ferraro on one part of this. The press did indeed pick up the story, but I can’t help but think there would have been more outrage if a “shine my shoes” shirt was making the rounds.

What I have found is there still is a lot of racism in the workplace but that tends to be more discreet, where sexism is often overt.

Many of the high level executive women I’ve interviewed for my book “From the Sandbox to the Corner Office” told me about public displays of sexism.

One CEO had a guy put his hand on her knee in a restaurant as he talked about how she probably slept her way to the top. And so many women in power have told me how they were asked if they were secretaries during meetings. If they had been black males, I’m assuming that would never have happened.

Why? We don’t think of women in authority roles.

My husband has an even more interesting theory. He says it’s all about the fear of getting beat up that’s ingrained in boys from a young age. They take that fear into their adults lives. Basically, they’re not afraid women will beat them up. They most fear other men so they’re not as inclined to get in the face of another male no matter what race.

That doesn’t mean they won’t discriminate behind the scenes, keeping other men down by not advancing them or paying them less. But with women, they not only hit a glass ceiling because of forces behind the scene, they are also being deriding face-to-face.

Now I think I’m pretty strong and can take on many men at Fight Club, aka, the workplace. But alas it’s not just about getting gals to lift weights.

Women still make up a small minority of top executives in Corporate America, and the numbers have actually been declining. We have to start seeing women, and I’m talking to women here as well, as leaders.

“All through my career I underestimated what I could do, until the last few years,” a high level, female executive from Wal-Mart told me. “You build a perception of your potential based on what you see, the people who break out of a mold. I grew up in a blue-collar town in the 1960s where the most successful women I saw were beauticians and administrative assistants.”

How did the women CEOs I got to know handle the blatant sexism?

They confronted the sexist individuals head on, and they also often let stupid comments slide. And they had to get to a point where they believed in themselves.

Clinton’s battle for the White House has been eye opening. Whether you support her or not, it has sparked an important national conversation.

I think she has moved us all closer to visualizing a woman as a leader. We just need to translate some of that to our offices and factories.

A “Sex and the City” tour guide?

Yes, that’s Lou Matthews’ job.

Riding around Manhattan on a tour bus filled with tourists from all over the world, from Texas to Serbia, Matthews shares trivia from the HBO series and points out hotspots the four sex-obsessed characters frequented on the show.

Matthews’ story is the first in a series I’m launching on CareerDiva today which I’m calling: Quirky jobs.

Matthews’ job is definitely unusual and in high demand right now as the first “Sex and the City” movie is set to hit movie theaters later this month.

“Sex” devotees have been heading to the Big Apple in droves to feel the beat of the city Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda call home and to vicariously live out these wacky gals’ adventures.

Matthews, herself a “Sex” addict, came across a Craigslist job posting a few years ago with tour guide company On Location Tours and jumped at the chance to apply for the “Sex” tour.

Being an aspiring actress herself, she felt the job would be a perfect fit. So she sent in her resume and headshot and ended up landing the gig, which pays about $25 an hour to start. Training included taking the tour three times and then she was handing the microphone and told, “your on.”

Thanks goodness she had experience interacting with people doing promotional work for tradeshows, and she’s often “the girl giving out free drinks.”

In her “Sex” job she has to be a social butterfly and be on all the time.

“It’s demanding,” says Matthews. “It’s kind of like doing a one-woman show.”

She typically meets the tourists at the fancy schmancy Plaza Hotel on Fifth Ave., and the bus is almost always filled to capacity with about 55 people. They tour about 40 “Sex” locations and all the while Matthews tantalizes tourists with tidbits from the show.

The biggest ooo’s and ahhs come when the group stops at the “Pleasure Chest,” a sex shop in the West Village. That’s where Charlotte buys the rabbit vibrator that she eventually gets addicted to, Matthews notes. “It’s a great ice breaker,” she adds.

Other stops include Magnolia Bakery, where Carrie told Miranda she had a crush on Aidan while the two friends were chomping on cupcakes.

And she also engages the tourists in a vote on whether Carrie should have ended up with Aidan, you know the guy from my “Big Fat Greek Wedding”, instead of Mr. Big, you know the guy from “Law and Order.”

The vote, she says, typically splits 50-50, but she admits to me that she’s partial to Aidan.

But what about the “Sex” girls’ biggest love interest, Cosmos?

Alas, Matthews does not drink the gals’ favorite cocktail on duty, but the bus does make a stop at Onieal’s bar, which is actually called Scout on the show and is frequented by the show’s characters, and the tourists are offered discounted Cosmos for $9. (Hey, it’s Manhattan.)

And forget the expensive clothing the women wear on the show.

As a struggling actress, Matthews can’t pony up the big bucks for Manolo Blahniks or Dolce&Gabbana, but she maintains, “I have an interest in fashion and I like to put myself together. But since I’m dashing around the city I wear chunky high heels, not stilettos.”

She’s proud of her job, which is basically part time with 16 hours a week so she has lots of time to pursue acting jobs when she’s not touring, and friends brag about what she does. But she admits she had trouble telling her dad because he never heard of the show. Being from Ohio, she worried he’d freak when he found out she does a “Sex and the City” tour.

Turns out, “he was cool about it.”

Now, being a “Sex” tour guide is probably not a life-long career.

So, what does this twenty something, who wouldn’t give her exact age because she’s “an actress”, see herself doing in the future?

“In an ideal world, I’ll be working on comedic projects,” she says. “But if this tour is still part of my life in five years I’ll embrace it.”

Cosmo anyone?

Just because women work at a job outside of the home doesn’t mean they don’t work inside the home. Hello!

Recently I had a public relations person send me a new survey on stay-at-home moms and the estimated salary they would make if the tasks they do everyday were translated into a real paycheck.

They drive kids around, cook meals, and counsel their children. So the people that came up with the survey figured they could equate a stay-at-home mom’s worth to similar jobs, like chauffeur, chef and shrink.

“For the past few years Salary.com has conducted a survey based on the time mother’s spend performing the most popular ‘mom job’ functions such as housekeeper, cook, driver, psychologist, etc. Salary.com calculated an annual salary that a mom would make (if she got a paycheck) based on these duties and hours spent, which is usually a full time job for stay-at-home moms,” explains Emily Kaswell, a spokeswoman for Salary.com.

Now, I’ve used Salary.com’s statistics and experts before. I find them a valuable source for my research. But boy, this survey got under my skin.

Here’s the calculation they come up with when they compared stay-at-home mom’s pretend annual salaries and the average pay for working moms:

Stay-at-home moms, $138,094, and $85,938 for working moms.

I don’t know about you guys but something is missing in this equation.

Working moms, just because they are working moms, do not give up the driving around, cooking or counseling duties.

If you go by Salary.com’s calculations that would mean working mothers should make a pretend salary of $224,032.

I’m not trying to belittle the importance of what stay-at-home moms do, but come on folks, women who work do it all whether they like it or not. There is very little down time with the responsibilities of a job and the home.

So why are we spending so much time trying to build up stay-at-home moms, even though two-third of moms work at a job outside the home? Salary.com even provides a calculator so you can figure out how much pretend money you are entitled to.

The reason we spend so much time trying to make mom’s who don’t work feel better is our society does not value the things required to run a household. That’s just the way it is. I doubt this will ever change.

It sucks folks, I know. But we need to stop feeling sorry for ourselves and be proud of whatever choices we make in our lives. The problem is not that people don’t realize how much money what we do would fetch in the marketplace. By doing calculations like this we fall prey to the very thing we are trying to fight against.

No value can be put on raising a family. We all know that.

Our efforts should be focused on making sure dads pick up more of the slack. Based on Salary.com’s premise, working dads average salaries are actually worth half of what they make if they don’t help out at home.

We should also be pushing the business world and the government to adopt more family friendly work policies like paid family leave and paid sick days. What about good child care?

Now that would make everyone’s life better, and it may encourage some moms who have been unable to figure out how to balance work and family to possibly go for a real paycheck.