Lawrence Summers, the Harvard University president who said women lack the knack for science and math, didn't figure on Ashley Willson.

Or her sister, Owen Stratton. Or her other sister, Avery Edmonson.

All of them are in accounting.

You do the math, because apparently, Summers, who is resigning his post this month, didn't: In the United States, an estimated 842,000 women are employed as accountants or auditors.

Women, in fact, have the profession's number, making up more than 60 percent of the accounting/auditing workforce, compared with about 39 percent in 1983.

As Education Secretary Margaret Spellings recently noted, girls seem to lose interest in math and science at some point in their educational careers.

On the other hand, when it comes to choosing a career steeped in arithmetic, women are finding that accounting adds up, says Willson, 37.

It wasn't always so.

By 1951, only about 500 women were certified public accountants in the United States, according to the Journal of Accountancy.

Even in the early 1970s, the journal reports, "more than one woman interviewing ... was told, 'We aren't hiring any women.' "

Today, many of the women do the hiring. And there are mentoring programs for women once they're hired.

"There is a war for talent," Willson says.

If so, women are doing most of the enlisting.

"We have 341 accounting majors in our undergraduate program," says Quinton Booker, chairman of the accounting department at Jackson State University in Mississippi. "About 71 percent are females. More females are entering the workforce, period, and I believe that plays a significant part."

They're certainly entering KPMG: At the firm's office in Jackson, Miss., Willson estimates that about 13 of the 19 people on the professional staff are women, including nonmanagers and partners.

For Willson and others, one allure of accounting is that it can be managed so it doesn't come between parents and their children. That's the bottom line for many female — and male — accountants.

"That has helped retain a lot of us," says Willson, who has three children, ages 7, 6 and 2. "If it had been a choice between my job and my family, I know which choice I would have made."

Willson and Stratton, partners in the firm, work full time. But, thanks to the nature of their work — plus laptops, cell phones, faxes and more — they can take care of business away from the business.

Of course, if you're benumbed by numbers, you're not going to like accounting, no matter what.

"I've always looked up to my dad (also an accountant) because he enjoyed his work," says Stephanie Henson, 20, an accounting major and rising junior at the University of Mississippi. "But he never forced me to do this. I found that I like it. It's one of those things where you either get it or you don't."

But there are minuses — long hours, for one, especially during the busy seasons, namely Sept. 30 to year's end, and, for tax accountants, the weeks leading up to April 15.