Student sex work is on the rise

Posted by Lance Gravlee on January 21, 2008 
Filed Under In the news

In France, more and more young women are selling their bodies to pay for their education, according to two new books featured today in The Guardian, a British newspaper.

One of the books is a memoir written by a 19-year-old student who turned to prostitution because her other part-time job didn’t cover the cost of living. The second book is a study of student prostitution based on interviews with young female “escorts” and their clients. The study suggests that the Internet has helped to expand the market for student sex-workers who cater to older, wealthier men.

It is difficult to know just how many French students engage in sex work, and estimates range widely. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, a French student union claims that up to 40,000 university students work as prostitutes, but police officials put the figure at 15,000 to 20,000 students. Whatever the exact number, the new books have apparently sparked public debate over the adequacy of financial aid for French university students.

As The Chronicle point out, this story isn’t the first we’ve heard about students working in sex-related jobs. In 2006, a study at Kingston University in London reported a 50 percent increase in the number of students who worked in the sex industry over a six year period. And more than 10 years ago, the book Ivy League Stripper made a splash with its account of a Brown University student who financed her education by working as a stripper.

Do these stories resonate with your experience? How common do you think sex work is among university students today?

Comments

8 Responses to “Student sex work is on the rise”

  1. Alexis Cummins on January 22nd, 2008 2:22 am

    As simply put, we all know sex sells. This post disappoints me, but it doesn’t really surprise me. It seems reasonable that if young girls cannot be financially supported to attend school, which is something that will benefit them in the long run, that they would turn to whatever means necessary to meet it, even if that means sex. Years ago people might not even dreamed of going to such extremes for an education, but schools have become more expensive, and the need for a college degree has grown drastically. If a person wants something bad enough, they will do what they have to to get it.
    Fortunately, I can afford my education, but for a split second this made me contemplate if I would go to such great lengths for an education. (I doubt I would.)

  2. Caitlain on January 22nd, 2008 2:50 pm

    Alexis, there’s more to it than mere financial conditions in many cases. Many young women today don’t regard casual sex as negatively as they did just a few short years ago, and as such, they don’t have “issues” using sex to make money like they used to. There’s no longer the huge negative stigma associated with being an escort that there used to be (generally speaking – obviously some negativity remains). Here at the U of Miami, I know several women who work as escorts and are even fairly open about it.

  3. Cheryl on January 22nd, 2008 6:28 pm

    I don’t believe that this comes as a big surprise. The cost of higher education (not to mention day-to-day living costs) is rising while our wages are not keeping up with the increase. In times of desparation people seem to come up with “creative” ways to supplement the income. How many jobs that are available to people without a college education want to pay more than $8-$9/hour? Those wages do not supply enough income for rent, food, gas, and utility bills, let alone a college education to boot.

    There are a couple movies that approach this subject. “Big Daddy” with Adam Sandler made mention that one of the characters worked at Hooter’s to get through school. Yet another movie, “She’s the One” (I think that was the title) with Jennifer Aniston also suggests that one of it’s characters used prostitution to pay for tuition.

    To me this post did not come as any huge surprise. It’s not the path I would choose to take, but desparate times call for desparate measures. How important is your education to you? Would you risk your health for it?

  4. Aryeh Jacobsohn on January 22nd, 2008 11:05 pm

    Money increasingly replaces other ties as the basis for interaction and the provision of social services. This (in America and beyond) includes everything from nursing homes for the elderly — once taken care of exclusively by kin — to, well, sex! It fits into a broader trend of interactions of all sorts increasingly being cast as transactions involving cash. In that regard, at least empirically, sex is not special.

  5. Caitlain on January 24th, 2008 6:36 pm

    Cheryl, I can assure you many of the girls working as escorts are not “desperate.” It is economics, pure and simple.

    It’d be interesting for Dr. Gravlee to find someone who works as an escort to come in and speak to the class.

  6. K on January 25th, 2008 3:47 pm

    I’ve been researching about student prostitution recently and have been stuggling to find figures for obvious reasons. Without sounding horrendously un-PC, do you think its fair to say that France’s notorious liberal attitude towards sex has lead to a large amount of student prostitutes?

  7. Lance Gravlee on January 26th, 2008 3:26 pm

    @Caitlain: We need to think carefully about your suggestion that college women who work as prostitutes are motivated by economics, as opposed to desperation. First, are you basing this claim on systematic evidence or on anecdotal impressions? In particular, I wonder what reasons young women in the new French study give for their decision to work as escorts. (I don’t read French, so I can’t say.)

    Second, “economics” and “desperation” aren’t necessarily opposed to one another. Economic desperation is the kind Cheryl seemed to have in mind.

    Third, how do you think young women weigh the financial incentives against the physical and emotional risks of sex work?

    Your suggestion of having escorts come to class is a great one. Any volunteers?

  8. Wooper Cullen on January 1st, 2009 12:33 am

    i dont see what the bigdeal is cause i do it all the time to get into schools. money is hard to get and sex is easy to do and if u have a problem with it then deal with it cause this is my life and i can spend it how i want and by the way i have 7 kids and counting and i am OK with that cause i am geting a good education and child support money from the kid’s fathers and a good humpin every now and then and boy does that feel good!! So BAM!!!!