Nobody is forcing anyone, it’s just the natural choice for the lower earning parent to step away from their job. If women to a high degree only marry higher earning spouses, then this is frequently going to be the woman.
That's not the natural choice. The natural choice is to find the bottom of the barrel outside care and have a second income because we've made it financially impossible to do anything else.
Sorry, it's true that the common choice is often for both parents to work. I meant the natural choice given that a couple has decided for one of the two parents to stay at home while their children are too young for school.
So then the assumption you're making is that women are the lower earners? Why is that? (Or why is that true?)
Because in a given couple, women typically match with men that earn more than them. Whether that is the “fault” of the woman or man is for anyone to decide.