I’d like to offer my very sincere and warm wishes to all mothers for a happy and restful Mother’s Day. Which begs the question, is a day of rest for mom actually possible?

A recent May, 2007 survey of 40,000 mothers conducted by Salary.com concluded that if a full-time mother were compensated for her work she would earn almost $140,000 a year. Mother’s who work full-time jobs outside the home put in $85,939 worth of work as mothers.

The survey found that the typical mother puts in a 92 hour work week and works at least 10 different jobs. In order of hours spent on those jobs per week, they are: housekeeper, day-care center teacher, cook, computer operator, laundry machine operator, janitor, facilities manager, van driver, chief executive officer and psychologist. By figuring out the median salaries for each position, and calculating the average number of hours worked at each (including overtime), the firm came up with $138,095.

Approximately 72% of mothers work at least part-time outside of the home. The proportion of working, married mothers with very young children peaked at 58 percent in 1998. Since then, it has fallen to 53 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports, and is continuing to drop. In 2005, the percentage of all mothers in the workforce hit an eight-year low.

Most women with children that make the choice voluntarily to leave the workforce do so when their children are young. The reasons are typically to spend more time with their children during their formative years, save money by not paying for childcare expenses and additional income taxes, and quite often reduce the incredible added stress of commuting and career to being a parent and maintaining a household. Unfortunately, many of the reasons more and more well educated and experienced mothers leave the workforce for a period of time is employer inflexibility and workplace bias to the needs and unpredictable schedules of working mother’s; especially those with young children.

The recent dip in women’s participation has started to limit the country’s potential for further growth, according to a report by the White House Council of Economic Advisers. The council says that when droves of women leave the workforce, it bleeds American businesses of some of their most highly educated workers, since women now account for 56 percent of the students enrolled in colleges and graduate schools. “Companies are estimating that it costs them about $80,000 in lost time and training and recruiting costs every time they lose a talented working mom,” says Suzanne Riss, editor in chief of Working Mother magazine.

The good news here is that many companies are waking up and offering to let moms commute or work flexible hours to avoid losing them altogether. A finding by the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, Hastings concluded that most mothers would prefer to keep working but are pushed out of the workplace by inflexibility, the lack of supports, and a workplace bias against mothers. A recent CWLL survey found that 86% of once employed, but now stay-at-home mom’s that left their jobs did so because of obstacles such as inflexible hours.

And not surprising is that a growing number of business savvy mother’s who stay at home to raise kids are networking together and fast becoming a significant segment of small business start-up entrepreneurs who take advantage of the Internet to market and promote their product or service from their home.