What shifts need to be implemented for the world to take the business of sex work more seriously? According to an article in The Economist, only ~0.5% of 35,450 National Bureau of Economic Research articles are about sex work. And apparently, even within the realm of academics and researchers who regularly study sex work, the focus is predominantly on the health or legal rather than the financial implications of the industry. It's as if there's an aversion to really reckoning with the *industry* aspect of the adult industry. Why is that?
It was fascinating thinking about how it compares to other industries. Pornography alone (not factoring in strip clubs, escorting, etc.) generates approximately $100 billion in yearly revenues which is twice as much as AI according to the article. That estimate is approximately 17.5% of global beauty industry revenues or 5.8% of the global alcohol industry, which is still substantial all things considered. Yet the adult industry is often trivialized in mainstream spaces and sex workers are treated as insignificant at best or pariahs at worst. I'm hopeful these trends will shift in the coming years. I'm curious to know what you all think.
Isn’t that the case with virtually every stigma? Old ways and stereotypical views give way to younger, more empathetic ones. Just look at the successes of the LGBTQ community as an example. What once seemed like it would never happen in my lifetime, i.e. gay marriage, was finally recognized as “real.” How did that happen? Honestly, it was more than just older, typically less sympathetic people to the cause passing away as it was also brave people coming out to friends and loved ones, showing who they truly were instead of hiding in the shadows any longer.
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Sex work can, and will imho, follow a similar path. In fact, it’s already happening. When I first started in this lifestyle, virtually no sex worker (especially escorts) showed their face publiccly. Now look at a platform like Tryst, where the majority of women are proudly face out. That’s a massive change in just the last 5–10 years.
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Again, when people realize their daughter, niece, sister, cousin, etc., are sex workers, it will begin to lose its stigma even more so. In big cities across the U.S., politicians and police, often due to limited resources, aren’t cracking down on consensual, of age sex work nearly as much as they did a decade ago. Instead, they’re focusing their finite resources on breaking up trafficking rings and going after those exploiting minors, as they should.
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I’m very hopeful about where this is all heading, but it will take more time. We have to look at where we were, to fully appreciate where we stand today, and the change so far has been quit remarkable, to say the least.
I appreciate your thorough response Robert. Some of what you've stated resonates with me. Over the last decade, things were steadily moving in a direction where increased awareness about sex work sometimes resulted in shifts in culture or even policy. More recently though, it seems like the pendulum is swinging back in the other direction. Even with the high visibility of sex workers and the popularity of the platforms sex workers utilize, the adult industry is not necessarily being taken more seriously.
In countries like the UK and here in the US, the industry has been facing renewed and intensified attacks. I am still hopeful, and I realize progress isn't always linear. I do agree with you about the importance of acknowledging indicators like a decrease in the amount of crackdowns in major cities. Thanks again for sharing your perspective.
Everyone assumes young people are more progressive but I don’t think that is the case anymore. It is definitely more nuanced than that. Gen Z is much more polarized and Gen Z men are way more conservative than millennials. Also, thanks to covid lockdowns and porn consumption habits, Gen Z can have unhealthy attitudes and relationships with sex regardless of political views. I’ve also noticed the pendulum seems to be swinging the other direction as well. I don’t think we can just assume younger generations are going to be magically more progressive and we can’t rely on them to bail us out.
This is what I was hinting at. Being in my late 30s, I've actually been surprised by the more conservative views about sex which are held by folks who are a decade or so younger than me. I wholeheartedly affirm their right to those opinions while also being very curious to know what are the possible causes for some of the changing trends. I think assuming all the onus lies with the next generation to push progress forward is an approach that is playing out in unexpected ways.
And that can be highly problematic as we all know. Is it possible you are letting your bias get in the way i.e. what you THINK younger peoples views are based on what you see and hear online, on TV, etc? Lets see what the research says about sex and sex work:
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Lena, since you said you were late 30s, I made the cut off 40 years old when i posed the question to AI. Here we go.
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What does polling data say about people over, and under 40 years old, re: their views on sex and sex work?
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There isn’t a single, clean “over 40 vs. under 40” polling series on sex work attitudes specifically—but when you piece together the best available polling and social research, a pretty consistent pattern emerges:
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1) Younger people are much more supportive of sex work (especially decriminalization)
* A major U.S. poll (Data for Progress/YouGov) found:
* About two-thirds of voters ages 18–44 support decriminalizing sex work
* Compared to a much lower share among older voters (about half)
That’s one of the clearest age splits we have: younger adults are not just slightly more supportive, they’re often majority supportive, while older ones are more divided or opposed.
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2) Younger people are generally more permissive about sexual norms overall
Even outside sex work specifically, polling shows strong age gradients:
* Younger adults are far more likely to say things like casual sex, explicit image-sharing, or nontraditional relationships are acceptable
* Example: In a PEW Research Poll, 70% of ages 18–29 say sexting can be acceptable vs. 21% of those 65+
So younger people’s higher acceptance of sex work fits into a wider pattern.
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3) Among younger people, the stigma of sex work is declining
Studies focusing on younger adults show:
* A shift away from strongly negative stigma, but still mixed or ambivalent views
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4) The big-picture pattern
Putting it all together:
* Under ~40
* More likely to support decriminalization
* More likely to view sex work through autonomy/rights lens
* Lower stigma overall
* Over ~40
* More skeptical or divided
* More likely to frame it in terms of morality, harm, or exploitation
* But not uniformly opposed—and sometimes more nuanced depending on question wording
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Bottom line
The strongest, most consistent polling takeaway is:
Age differences around sex work mirror broader generational differences in sexual norms i.e. younger people are significantly more permissive and more supportive of decriminalization, while older people are more cautious or divided.
Lena and I are discussing Gen Z. Your polling data includes people between the ages of 18-45, which includes millennials. Gen Z are about 14-29 years old and Millennials are about 30-45 years old. Your data is going to be skewed and doesn’t really refute what we’re saying about Gen Z.
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I think you’re kind of missing the point we’re making about Gen Z. They have a terrible personal relationship with sex. This is probably due to a combination of Covid lockdowns, overexposure and addiction to porn, and attacks on abortion rights and birth control. As a result Gen Z is having way less sex than generations before it. Also, the rise in popularity and influence of Red Pill/Manosphere influencers suggests large portions of Gen Z hold regressive views on sex and sex work.
in our culture that would make sex work a viable profession for a much bigger percentage of American girls. For example, statistics in South Korea show that 20% of women will do sex work at some time in their lives, so it doesn't carry the stigma that it does here in the US. When you get to that number, there is hardly a single person that doesn't have a close friend or family member who has been a sex worker, so it's just another parttime job that young or middle aged women do when they have a financial goal they want to achieve, like starting a business, getting a university degree, or meeting a better class of men, so there is little judgment attached to this choice.