by Jeanette R. Harrison, MPH
The Real Tampon Tax
I'm in my 50s. All the same, a few weeks ago, I found myself in a familiar predicament: I needed a tampon.
I had a spare in my purse, but I knew that wasn't going to last me all day. None of the bathrooms at work had tampons. I had barely started this job, so I didn’t want to walk up to a complete stranger to ask for one.
I thought, “I’ll go to a public restroom and get one.” No such luck. There were disposal containers for feminine hygiene products—but no actual products.
Moreover, a lot of the bathrooms were locked, or you had to stand in an hour-long line at a restaurant just to get a key. I finally found a store that sold tampons. It was $13 for a box of six. That’s over $2 a tampon. That’s charging women almost 10 times more for something they need for their health and hygiene.
That’s what I call the tampon tax.
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| Photo is AI-generated Access to period products isn't a luxury. It's a basic need. No one should have to feel like they have to ask permission to take care of their basic health and hygiene. Or like they can't afford it because they don't have 50 cents in their pocket. |
Even in workplaces and other places that actually have tampon "vending machines," women are taxed. The tampons cost 25 to 50 cents apiece, which is full retail price—even though the business, school, or city can order them at discounted rates.
Women are expected to carry quarters around in their pockets at all times—“just in case.” And even if they had the quarters, the machines could be broken or empty... especially in schools.
But the real tax isn't the cost of tampons or pads. It’s the emotional tax, the social tax, the educational tax, and the professional tax. It’s the lifelong price women pay just for having periods.
Maybe there’s a middle-aged male facilities budget manager somewhere, peering through his Mr. Magoo glasses, who redlines tampons from the budget because they “cost the district too much.” They buy a “supply” at the beginning of the year and put the tampons in old, broken machines that never really worked in the first place. Then, halfway through the year, the budget manager decides to stop ordering tampons because “they just aren’t used at school.”
Why does a middle school or high school girl need to bring money to school to take care of her basic hygiene and health needs? Maybe schools should add tampons and feminine hygiene products to the school supply list.
Imagine being a 15-year-old girl in high school, suddenly realizing you got your period and don’t have anything with you. Your choices?
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Ask a teacher, who might be your male history teacher, for a tampon and to be excused to the bathroom.
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Try to go to the nurse’s office, if there’s a nurse on duty, hoping she has supplies... and praying no kids you know are there overhearing you ask for a tampon.
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Keep tampons in your locker and hope you have enough time between classes to get to your locker, put your books away, sneak out a tampon, go to the bathroom, and get to class on time.
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Or tough it out and quietly bleed through your jeans, praying no one notices.
Now, let’s say that same girl knows the downtown Boise Public Library stocks free tampons and pads in the restroom. But what’s she supposed to do—ask her teacher for a hall pass to the public library to get a tampon?
It’s like, “Everyone is Welcome." Unless you’re having your period.
Not providing tampons in public restrooms, businesses, and schools is like telling women they should go sit in the bathhouse until they’re no longer “unclean,” like in Biblical days.
And let’s be honest: the girl probably wouldn’t get the hall pass to the library anyway, because she wouldn’t want to explain to her teacher, in front of the whole class, that she’s on her period and needs a tampon.
That’s the tampon tax.
It’s the tax of shame, the tax of silence, the tax of having to ask permission to manage your own body. It’s a tax that trains girls from an early age to handle their needs discreetly, apologetically while they suffer in silence and are uncomfortable.
Students can’t learn when their basic needs aren’t met—and that includes access to tampons.
Lack of access affects more than just a woman’s or a girl’s clothes. It affects her confidence, her mental health, and her education.
When women and girls can’t manage their periods with dignity, they:
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Miss class time or work time (or stop showing up altogether).
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Struggle with anxiety about leaks or being teased.
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Internalize shame about their bodies.
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Lose focus because they’re physically uncomfortable or in pain.
Not having access to something as basic as a tampon or pad isn’t just inconvenient. It’s degrading. It sends the message that the basic biological needs of women and girls don’t matter.
We wouldn’t ask boys to go through gym class without deodorant or offer toilet paper only if they asked a coach first. What if they had to pay 25 cents to flush every time they used the urinal to cover the cost of urinal cakes?
So why do we still make girls do backflips just to get period products?
If there can be toilet paper in every bathroom stall, there can be tampons in every bathroom stall.
Women and girls shouldn’t have to ask permission to care for themselves—or be charged a “tax” for products tied to basic hygiene and health.
Let’s stop pretending this is a small issue. It’s not.
The tampon tax is real, and it affects girls and women all over the country.
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