Are policies like menstrual leave empowering, or do they unintentionally disadvantage women in hiring?

The intent behind menstrual leave policies is easy to respect. They acknowledge that menstruation can cause real physical discomfort and push back against the expectation that women simply absorb it without acknowledgement. Several Indian companies and some states have introduced such policies, and many women have welcomed them.

But good intentions do not settle the question of effect. And here, it is worth thinking carefully about who actually bears the cost.

If an employer must grant paid leave that applies only to women, then hiring a woman carries a cost that hiring a man does not. In sectors with thin profit margins, a garment factory, a small business, or a startup, that difference can influence hiring decisions at the margin. Research on mandatory maternity leave benefits across multiple countries finds a consistent pattern. When employers must bear the full cost of policies that apply only to women, formal sector hiring of women tends to fall, particularly in smaller enterprises.

There is a broader version of this problem. Women’s safety in public transport, access to childcare, and adequate workplace facilities are not private obligations;; they are necessary safety requirements that constitute a public good the state has largely failed to provide. When law responds to that failure not by fixing it, but by making employers responsible for it instead, it turns every woman an employer might hire into a regulatory liability. The policy intended to support women makes them a more expensive hire.

This is not an argument against taking these issues seriously. It is an argument for thinking carefully about the mechanism, and asking whether there are ways to address the underlying problem that do not reduce women’s access to work.