Orange females

I have been told that 80% of orange cats are male. I was curious about 2 things:
1) Does that mean the totally orange cats or are the orange with white cats included in that ratio?
and
2) Is there a particular combination of coat colors in the parents that predisposes orange females in the litter?
Thanks in advance.

The gene controlling orange/nonorange is on the X chromosome. Females have 2 X chromosomes, males are XY. So a male only needs one orange gene to be orange, a female needs a copy from each of her parents as the orange/nonorange combination would make her a tortoiseshell. This is a pair of genes that show codiminance (i.e., neither hides the other by being dominant). So, yes, it is harder for a female to be orange, although I can't quote any statistics.

The white spotting is caused by another pair of genes, so "orange" does include "orange and white" when we're talking about the inheritance of orange color.

In answer to your part (2), parents with orange color will pass it on to their kittens. Orange males pass on the orange gene, as do orange females. Tortie females pass on the orange gene to half their kittens. So 2 orange parents will have orange kittens, an orange male x tortie female can also produce orange females.

Wow, I didn't know Esper was that special. She's an orange female.