Having a two-inch heel supporting you during the work day is no longer in fashion; more working women today opt for sensible shoes in the name of better health and comfort.
      A report presented this week at the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons meeting in New York found only 21 percent of working women wear high heels. That's down from 34 percent in 1990, according to Dr. Carol Frey of the University of California at Los Angeles.
      Younger women and women with higher incomes prefer low-heeled pumps, flats with less than a one-inch heel or athletic shoes. Dr. Frey says many middle-age women and women with incomes below $25,000 a year tend to wear the high heels.
      High-heeled shoes, which are often tight and pointed, are known to cause pinched nerves, bunions, hammer toes and ingrown toenails. They are also connected to knee and back problems. The design of many high-heeled shoes also causes the wearer to place a great deal of body weight on the balls of her feet, which can lead to injury. Dr. Frey says high-heeled shoes simply are not compatible with how human beings walk.