Labor Market for Sex Workers: Stigma and Occupational Choice

Abstract

This chapter provides a survey of literature on sex work. Long standing debates on sex work range across disciplines with questions on how to name the profession, how to regulate it, and whether the profession should be criminalized. Much of the debates have philosophical roots on questions of morality of the occupation and objectification of the body and underlie empirical and policy research in sex work. The question of morality, especially in the context of purchased sex as opposed to “free” sex or sex within marriage, has been amply discussed in the literature with questions arising because of the binary distinction between purchasable sex and sex within marriage. These moral standpoints often influence the legislative frameworks within which sex work is located with different countries following prohibitionist, regulatory, or abolitionist frameworks on the profession. Research from different countries across the world suggests that the market for sex work differs both in developed and developing countries according to how the trade is regulated and that various factors affect labor market outcomes for sex workers. Notably, how stigmatized the trade is affects the agency of sex workers, thereby affecting their earnings and how susceptible they are to violence in the trade.