Excerpt: For all the strides that women have made in the workplace ... one sub-group has been left behind: older women. Those within five years of the normal retirement age have made no progress-- relative to men's earnings-- since 1975, according to a recent census report. Those within 10 years of retirement have advanced exactly one percentage point; by 1999, they were earning 56 percent of what men earned. Discrimination? Perhaps. But the findings suggest other factors are at work.