The mommy wars are back in the news, with The New York Times reporting that women are leaving the work force for the same reasons as men, layoffs and other tough economic changes, not motherhood in Poor Economy Slows Women in Workplace.

Congressional economist Heather Boushey sums up the latest research:

"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."

Of course, some moms are leaving their jobs to raise families, but the article points out that a dip in work force participation by women in the early 2000s was perceived at least by some economists as a motherhood movement. Research suggests moms and dads are leaving because they got laid off, outsourced, saw their wages cut or hit another economic barrier on the job.

Earlier in the story:

They [women] had piled into jobs in growing numbers since the 1960s. But that stopped happening this decade, and as the nearly seven-year-old recovery gives way to hard times, the retreat is likely to accelerate.

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. In each of the seven previous recoveries since 1960, the recovery ended with a greater percentage of women at work than when it began.

I have wondered how much of the mommy wars, often public battles between stay-at-home and working moms over work-family balance, was created and driven by the media. I was never convinced most moms and dads were consumed by the wars.

What do folks think? How heated are the mommy wars?