Sexual Self-Employment

Both the Netherlands and New Zealand have decriminalized the sex trade. According to The Economist, the New Zealand prostitutes are faring far better—in part because their country took decriminalization much further:

In the Netherlands and Nevada, the business is confined to brothels, which are usually run by businessmen rather than the sex workers themselves.

Clearly, the brothel-masters' status as the sole legal providers of commercial sex enhances their grip on the women who work for them. In New Zealand, prostitutes can fend for themselves. As well as letting them keep all their earnings, this independence gives them freedom to reject nasty clients and unsafe practices. "They feel better protected by the law and much more able to stand up to clients and pushy brothel operators," says Catherine Healy, head of the New Zealand Prostitutes Collective.

Unsurprisingly, the New Zealand system's critics include brothel owners, both in that country and elsewhere. Going with a girl outside a licensed establishment is like "Russian roulette", says the website of the Chicken Ranch, a brothel that serves the Las Vegas crowd. In New Zealand, one brothel keeper fumes that the earnings of independent sex workers are "tax-free money, which is not benefiting the Inland Revenue Department".