Belgian Sex Workers Gain Access to Paid Leave, Right To Refuse Sex Acts
Belgian sex work groups are cheering the new law. But it could come with some downsides.
In Belgium, sex workers can now sign formal employment contracts. That grants them access to the same benefits that other Belgian workers can access, plus some specialized protections.
Under the new law, which took effect Sunday, sex work employees have access to paid public holidays and to Belgium's version of Social Security. Sex workers will also have access to paid sick days, maternity leave, and health insurance plans.
"Today is a very historical day for us sex workers," posted Mel Meliciousss—part of the Belgian sex workers union known as UTSOPI—on Instagram.
The new law also stipulates that sex workers have a right to refuse particular sex acts and clients without retaliation, setting up a mediation scheme for this all-too-common situation.
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From Decriminalization to Employment Contracts
Prostitution and other forms of sex work are broadly legal in Belgium. In 2022, the country became the first in modern Europe to officially decriminalize paying for sex, being paid for sex, and facilitating such transactions. As I noted at the time, a
number of European countries have legalized prostitution. That means it's allowed under specific and highly regulated circumstances but still a crime outside these parameters. For instance, in Greece, sex workers must register with the state and have a professional certificate, get twice-monthly medical exams, and work in a licensed brothel in order for their labor to be legal. Other European countries have instituted asymmetrical criminalization, in which selling sex is allowed (under certain circumstances) but paying for it is not. But Belgium is the first European country to officially decriminalize selling sex, paying for it, and working with sex workers, under a proposal put forth by Federal Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborn and approved by Parliament last week.
The change meant more than just a shift in the way sex work was policed. It meant that sex work could be formally recognized by authorities as a valid form of employment. A sex worker applying for a bank loan could list this as her source of income. A sex worker who lost his job could apply with the state for unemployment benefits. And so on.
Decriminalization was the first step. But while the law said sex workers could legally be self-employed or hire third parties to help them in their sex work efforts, it did not allow for sex workers to be formally hired as employees.
That next step came in a law that passed in May and took effect yesterday. It defines sex work as "the performance of acts of prostitution in execution of a contract of employment as a sex worker"and says adults "may enter into an employment contract as a sex worker." This grants sex workers access to the types of employee benefits and social welfare schemes that employees of other types of businesses are eligible for. (Notably, "sex workers will be able to work under hotel-restaurant-cafe…contracts that do not mention sex work" to protect their anonymity, according to the UTSOPI website.)
A Right to Refuse Sex Acts
The new law gained international attention when it was passed, with coverage largely focusing on a provision concerning sex worker employees who refuse sex acts.
As I wrote in this newsletter in May, "the law imposes obligations on both businesses that employ sex workers and on sex workers who work for those businesses." This includes a provision stating that "every sex worker has the right to refuse a client," that "every sex worker has the right to refuse a sexual act," and that "every sex worker has the right to interrupt a sexual act at any time."
Writing a sex work employment contract is tricky, because unlike at, say, a factory job—where the parameters of the work tend to be well-known in advance and can be laid out in a contract—"you cannot force somebody to have sex," pointed out Meliciousss on Instagram. So the contract has to acknowledge that a formal job requires certain obligations while also protecting sexual and bodily autonomy.
The way it was ultimately written means "that when you go work as a sex worker for an [employer] they cannot force you to do something you don't want to do," said Meliciousss. "They cannot force you to something without condoms. They cannot force you to do some sexual acts you don't want to do. They cannot force you to do something with a client you don't want to do."
But if this happens too frequently, the employer can request that the state intervene. Either a sex worker or a sex work employer can request government mediation if an employee refuses sex acts more than 10 times in a six-month period.
Tradeoffs
For libertarians, the overall law is a mixed bag. We don't want the state mandating that private employers provide things like parental leave and health insurance, instead favoring voluntary solutions. We're also critical of expansive social welfare benefits. But if the state is going to generally require that business to offer certain benefits, or generally offer old-age pension schemes and unemployment payouts, is it just to exempt sexually oriented businesses?
Basically, the law lets sex workers be treated like any other workers in many respects. On one level, that seems only fair—equal treatment under the law. Yet the law's expansiveness could have negative effects in practice. Taking a utilitarian perspective, I think it's unclear whether it will be a net negative or positive for Belgian sex workers.
Having the option to enter into employment contracts is undoubtedly good, for both sex workers and employers. And the fact that a sex worker can officially sign an employment contract also does not mean that she or he has to in order to work legally. Unlike many legalization schemes throughout Europe, Belgium's law does not mean that selling sex outside of an employment contract is illegal; sex workers can still independently work for themselves and hire others legally.
But adding an extensive roster of regulations that sexually oriented businesses must follow and benefits they must offer could discourage the development of relatively safe and legal workplaces for sex work. And this could be especially bad for more marginalized groups of sex workers. As in all markets, there are tradeoffs to consider.
The key question here is whether sex workers can still work in less formal arrangements for a sex business—as freelancers or independent contractors. Or, to put it another way: Can a sex work business that expects high worker turnover, caters to a more transient workforce, or is otherwise not in a great position to offer formal employment contracts still operate legally?
I think the answer is no, but I'm not sure. The law itself defines sex work as "the performance of acts of prostitution in execution of a contract of employment as a sex worker" and states that it may "not be performed as part of a flexi-job contract, nor as a casual worker." But does that mean that no legal sex work on a flex/casual basis is allowed? Or merely that it's not allowed under an employment contract?
The ideal situation is one where sex workers looking for steady, long-term employment have the option to become formal employees, but people looking for short-term employment or something less formal can still find work in a legal (and therefore likely safer) place. One concern with that system from a labor perspective might be that many sex businesses would hire only freelancers. But businesses would still have incentives to offer formal employment contracts: attracting top-tier talent, seeking good worker retention, courting public opinion, and being seen as a more upscale or respectable or ethical business (which could be good both for social cache and for marketing to certain clienteles).
And whatever perceived benefits there are to mandating that all sex-work businesses offer employment contracts, this could in practice lead to less hiring overall, fewer legal businesses overall, and fewer opportunities for more marginalized workers to be able to work in a legal business. In effect, it could leave certain groups of sex workers with no choice but to work on the black market or rely on coercive pimps.
Sex Work Groups Celebrating
Sex worker rights groups in Belgium certainly see this as a major win.
"This is an incredible step forward," Isabelle Jaramillo, coordinator of Espace P, told the Associated Press. "It means their profession can finally be recognized as legitimate by the Belgian state." Jaramillo also notes that "under the previous legislation, hiring someone for sex work automatically made you a pimp, even if the arrangement was consensual. Now, they'll have to apply for state authorization to hire employees."
"If there is no law and your job is illegal, there are no protocols to help you," the president of UPSOPI told the BBC. "This law gives people the tools to make us safer."
But UTSOPI notes that decriminalization and employment contracts don't mean an end to authorities trying to outlaw sex work. "We already see certain municipalities hiding behind the words 'safety' and 'hygiene' to promulgate very strict local regulations that make sex work almost impossible on their territory."
More Sex & Tech News
• Australia's Parliament has passed a law requiring social media platforms to ban users under age 16. "The law will make platforms including TikTok, Facebook, Snapchat, Reddit, X and Instagram liable for fines of up to 50 million Australian dollars ($33 million) for systemic failures to prevent children younger than 16 from holding accounts," AP reports. "The platforms have one year to work out how they could implement the ban before penalties are enforced."
• Australia is also considering a law that would allow the state to issue big fines against tech companies that authorities deem to have suppressed competition.
• And one more from Australia: The state of Victoria decriminalized sex work in 2022, but battles over the law's parameters are still ongoing. A sex worker who was evicted from her rental home after her landlord found out she was seeing clients there is preparing to sue, according to The Guardian.
• Elon Musk is still fighting in court to prevent OpenAI from converting from a nonprofit to a for-profit company, reports CNBC. Musk sued OpenAI in a California state court in March, then withdrew that complaint and refiled a few months later in federal court. The complaint accuses OpenAI and Microsoft of violating federal racketeering and antitrust laws.
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