The History of Prostitution and Its Economic Power

Prostitution is the oldest profession in our society and has changed dramatically over time with legalities, expectations in exchanges, culture, and power. The growth of a leisure and tourist economy has contributed the most significant influence to the changes we see in prostitution today compared to when it began. After World War II, Western society had a major transition where consumption rather than production ran society. Since then, the buying and selling of more private activities have become normalized including cooking, childcare, and even companionship. Evolving into a leisure and tourist society has only further encouraged the buying of human relationships. The selling of sex services has become one of the most powerful contributing factors in our global economy. However, it has been historically evident that the major class, race, gender, and ethnic inequalities involved in a growing leisure economy are also present.

Leisure economies heavily depend on the lowest class of people in society to ensure the economy flourishes. Ironically, we see a pattern in richer countries implementing strict policies on immigration where work permits and visas are restricted. In the U.S., women in poverty working in the labor force receive the lowest pay and recognition. We see racial inequalities where poor women of color are disproportionately paid lower wages, while white women have power and better pay in occupations that are more respected by society. In a growing leisure and tourist economy, we have seen a major increase in independent workers due to service work becoming more employee-directed and autonomous. However, there is a negative side to this where work can become dangerous and controlling. One of the more popularized, independent jobs is sex work. In the last 50 years, sex work and sexual diversity have increasingly been accepted by more groups in society. Since the beginning of the 1900s, we have seen the sex business become one of the largest industries in our economy. As our leisure economy has grown, selling sex has become normalized where it’s common to now see sexualization in all forms of mainstream media. Because of this, sex has become a central part of not only our economy, but also our socialization and culture.

With sports being one of the largest industries in the U.S. economy, the sex industry beats all of them combined. According to Brents, online adult websites alone have increased by 1400% since 1997, having over 1.5 million active sites today. At that time the online industry was making two billion dollars annually, whereas just this year they have made a profit of almost 82 billion dollars. A little less than ten years later, Brents also shows how the dance industry in sex work was also profiting about two billion annually, by 2005. However, the erotic dance industry has also almost quadrupled in growth since. With continuous technological advancements, we can see how increasingly disposable pornography and sex work have become, where it is constantly at our fingertips with a simple search. 

Being in a capitalist society, where service work is increasingly popularized as we grow into a more leisurely economy, we know regardless of the power the sex industry holds over our society that sex work is not the only type of service work where you sell a relationship or emotional labor, such as customer service jobs we see regularly. Sex work is also similar to other personal services where it can be dehumanizing due to the boundaries being crossed of intimacy and economic exchange. However, Brent provides research showing how sex work can also be freeing when modernized ways of exchange become more controllable. Brent found that modern consumers of the industry continue to pursue prostitution because of their interest in the adrenaline rush they get from the transgressive nature of the exchange. 

Scholars reveal how normalizing boundaries being crossed between sexual bodies, intimacy, and economic exchanges then reintroduces a society where women are continuously objectified, exploited, and oppressed. Brent rebuts this argument by showing research findings of positive attitudes and decreasing stigmas towards prostitution as wider acceptance becomes more popular. The growth of the global sex industry has completely changed the context of sexual exchanges where prostitutes have more autonomy depending on their cultural, economic, social, and historical contextual background. The meaning of the sale of sex has been modernized through our cultural, economic, and technological advancements. However, it is crucial to recognize the history behind the oldest profession in our society that is only legalized in the state of Nevada. 

Citations

Hausbeck, K., Jackson, C., & Brents, B. (2009, December 16). The State of Sex. Taylor & Francis. 

Media, I. (2021, August 20). A Brief History of America Hating Sex Workers. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPNbYtv0Gpo