Women are still absent nearly twice as often as their male counterparts in the workplace.

The obvious answer from human resource experts, employers, employees and even us in the media is always that “working moms have most of the responsibilities at home,

Both married and unmarried women with children report a higher rate of absences than those without children,” says Terence McMenamin with the department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. Among single dads, the absentee rate is also higher than the rate for men without children

McMenamin points out, is that married men with kids actually report a lower rate of absences than men without children.

Even among people who have no children at home,” he adds, “the reported absence rate is higher among women than among men

Making assumptions on why women call in sick can be detrimental to the advancement of women in the workplace

managers expect women to be absent more often, and that, in turn, can creates an air of unreliability around female employees