Wives and whores are economic goods

[mawilson 2,133]

The Economics Of Prostitution

Michael Noer, 02.14.06, 12:00 PM ET

Wife or #######?

The choice is that simple. At least according to economists Lena Edlund and Evelyn

Korn, it is.

The two well-respected economists created a minor stir in academic circles a few

years back when they published "A Theory of Prostitution" in the Journal of Political

Economy. The paper was remarkable not only for being accepted by a major journal

but also because it considered wives and whores as economic "goods" that can be

substituted for each other. Men buy, women sell.

Economists have been equating money and marriage ever since Nobel Prize-winning

economist Gary Becker published his seminal paper "A Theory of Marriage" in two

parts in 1973 and 1974--also, not coincidentally, in the Journal of Political Economy.

Becker used market analysis to tackle the questions of whom, when and why we marry.

His conclusions? Mate selection is a market, and marriages occur only if they are

profitable for both parties involved.

Becker allowed nonmonetary elements, like romantic love and companionship, to be

entered into courtship's profit and loss statement. And children, in particular, were

important. "Sexual gratification, cleaning, feeding and other services can be purchased,

but not children: Both the man and the woman are required to produce their own children

and perhaps to raise them," he wrote.

But back to whores: Edlund and Korn admit that spouses and streetwalkers aren't

exactly alike. Wives, in truth, are superior to whores in the economist's sense of being

a good whose consumption increases as income rises -- like fine wine. This may explain

why prostitution is less common in wealthier countries. But the implication remains that

wives and whores are -- if not exactly like Coke and Pepsi -- something akin to champagne

and beer. The same sort of thing.

As with Becker, a key differentiator in Edlund and Korn's model is reproductive sex.

Wives can offer it, whores can not.

To be fair, Edlund and Korn were merely building an admittedly grossly simplified model of

human behavior in an attempt to answer a nagging question: Why do hookers make so much

money? Prostitution is, seemingly, a low-skill but high-pay profession with few upfront costs,

micro-miniskirts and stiletto heels aside.

Yet according to data assembled from a wide variety of times and places, ranging from

mid-15th-century France to Malaysia of the late 1990s, prostitutes make more money -- in some

cases, a lot more money -- than do working girls who, well, work for a living. This held true

even for places where prostitution is legal and relatively safe. In short, streetwalkers aren't

necessarily being paid more for their increased risk of going to jail or the hospital.

Notwithstanding Jerry Hall's quip when she was married to Mick Jagger, about being "a maid

in the living room and a ####### in the bedroom," one normally cannot be both a wife and a

#######. "Combine this with the fact that marriage can be an important source of income for

women, and it follows that prostitution must pay better than other jobs to compensate for the

opportunity cost of forgone-marriage market earnings," Edlund and Korn conclude.

Ouch.

Another zinger: "This begs the question of why married men go to prostitutes (rather than

buying from their wives, who presumably will be low-cost providers, considering that they can

sell nonreproductive sex without compromising their marriage)." Guys, nothing says "Happy

Valentine's Day" more than "low-cost provider."

Of course, it's easy to pour cold water on some of the assumptions made in Edlund and Korn's

mathematical model. But these so-called "stylized facts" are supposed to predict human

behavior; they don't necessarily pretend to mirror it.

In particular, the assumption that there is no "third way" between wife and ####### is

problematic, if not outright offensive: "The third alternative, working in a regular job but not

marrying, can be ruled out, since we assume that the only downside of marriage for a woman

is the forgone opportunity for prostitution."

Be sure to let all your married friends know what they're missing.

Also, the emphasis on the utility of children is puzzling. In most Western democracies, fertility

rates have plummeted as wealth has increased. Empirically, men not only buy fewer whores

as they get richer, but they have fewer children.

Still, the economic analysis of marriage explains one age-old phenomenon: gold digging.

"In particular, does our analysis justify the popular belief that more beautiful, charming and

talented women tend to marry wealthier and more successful men?" wrote Becker.

His answer: "A positive sorting of nonmarket traits with nonhuman wealth always, and with

earnings power, usually, maximizes commodity output over all marriages."

In other words, yes, supermodels do prefer aging billionaires. And Gary Becker proved it

mathematically decades before The Donald married Melania.

Source

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Ok, I read this once and I only have one conclusion. I need to read it again.

[mercuryroad 0]

Can I be my fiancee's #######? That would be sweet.....plus I'm fairly confident she would pay for my services. I could use a little extra money. We could even have performance reviews and exit surveys (wink, wink). I could form a company called Laid in the USA or Men at Work. Need a new name to protect my innocense though......how about Mercury Rising?

[Dixie_Peach 1]

Can I be my fiancee's #######? That would be sweet.....plus I'm fairly confident she would pay for my services. I could use a little extra money. We could even have performance reviews and exit surveys (wink, wink). I could form a company called Laid in the USA or Men at Work. Need a new name to protect my innocense though......how about Mercury Rising?

[almaty 19]

Can I be my fiancee's #######? That would be sweet.....plus I'm fairly confident she would pay for my services. I could use a little extra money. We could even have performance reviews and exit surveys (wink, wink). I could form a company called Laid in the USA or Men at Work. Need a new name to protect my innocense though......how about Mercury Rising?

now that was funny merc....

[Fandango 1,439]

Well, I think there is soemthing to link SOME wives to prostitutes....not all, mind you.

[almaty 19]

Well, I think there is soemthing to link SOME wives to prostitutes....not all, mind you.

and men too male whores..not all men

[Fandango 1,439]

Well, I think there is soemthing to link SOME wives to prostitutes....not all, mind you.

and men too male whores..not all men

Well yeah, I shoulda said that too....

I know this woman who will not be with a man unless he has $X ....all her boyfriends are filthy rich. Where is the line drawn between prostitution & just 'happen' to date rich guys?

[slim 1,525]

A woman who only dates rich guys is a prostitute.

I've seen a lot of girls who will be with one guy who they really like, but then go out with another guy because he "takes care of" them. By take care of, what they really mean is; buy them ###### and pay their bills. Sex for money is prostitution. Even if you sugarcoat it as a relationship, it's still prostitution.

However, marriage as an institution is set up as a financial agreement. On a biological level, it makes no sense whatsoever for a man to get married, EVER!!! Men are supposed to be spreading their genes around and procreating as much as possible. Women are supposed to raise the healthiest offspring possible. In today's world, the most secure way to do that is to get married.

Prostitutes do get paid more money. What other job do you need no education or training and no experience? Plus, you get to set your own hours, take a day off here and there, relocate whenever/wherever you want, and there is a market for it everywhere. Sounds like a dream job. Wonder why more women don't do it.

[Fandango 1,439]

A woman who only dates rich guys is a prostitute.

I've seen a lot of girls who will be with one guy who they really like, but then go out with another guy because he "takes care of" them. By take care of, what they really mean is; buy them ###### and pay their bills. Sex for money is prostitution. Even if you sugarcoat it as a relationship, it's still prostitution.

However, marriage as an institution is set up as a financial agreement. On a biological level, it makes no sense whatsoever for a man to get married, EVER!!! Men are supposed to be spreading their genes around and procreating as much as possible. Women are supposed to raise the healthiest offspring possible. In today's world, the most secure way to do that is to get married.

Prostitutes do get paid more money. What other job do you need no education or training and no experience? Plus, you get to set your own hours, take a day off here and there, relocate whenever/wherever you want, and there is a market for it everywhere. Sounds like a dream job. Wonder why more women don't do it.

I agree with you...but what about the other side of the coin?

My first marriage was to a guy with not a lot of smarts (understatement here ). Everything came hard for him workwise and we were always scraping by. He worked REALLY hard for everything he got, because there was no other choice. This time around, when I met D....I knew he was smart from the way he talked. Security is a big deal for me, and I didn't want to have to do that live from check to check ####### again. It was a side to D that I did find attractive. As we got serious, I like the fact that he had the capacity to make a solid living.

I think this could be grey area, cos I'm certainly not with him because he's 'rich' *he's not rich, btw*

Edited March 5, 2006 by LisaD

[slim 1,525]

If you find a guy you like and he just so happens to be rich too.... well, good on ya!

But everyone has those girlfriends or maybe that one girl that they know that will meet an awesome guy and say "well, he's just too poor for me." That's a #######.

Choosing a rich guy over a poor guy, providing everything else is the same, doesn't make you a prostitute, it makes you smart.

[franklie 0]

an interesting topic.

[Ban Hammer 13,337]

an interesting topic.

oh yeah. i gotta read this one.

[Empress of Groovy 373]

A woman who only dates rich guys is a prostitute.

I'd say that's a bit simplistic, and, of course, "rich" is relative. How about a woman who only dates guys who earn slightly more than she does? Or someone who actually earns less but who is a spendthrift and likes to lavish her with gifts? (designer fondue pots, for example?)

What about a woman who will only date guys who work in the non-dairy whipped topping industry? Or who are in a band?

Many questions for the modern age...

[panamania79 2]

The Economics Of Prostitution

Michael Noer, 02.14.06, 12:00 PM ET

Wife or #######?

The choice is that simple. At least according to economists Lena Edlund and Evelyn

Korn, it is.

The two well-respected economists created a minor stir in academic circles a few

years back when they published "A Theory of Prostitution" in the Journal of Political

Economy. The paper was remarkable not only for being accepted by a major journal

but also because it considered wives and whores as economic "goods" that can be

substituted for each other. Men buy, women sell.

Economists have been equating money and marriage ever since Nobel Prize-winning

economist Gary Becker published his seminal paper "A Theory of Marriage" in two

parts in 1973 and 1974--also, not coincidentally, in the Journal of Political Economy.

Becker used market analysis to tackle the questions of whom, when and why we marry.

His conclusions? Mate selection is a market, and marriages occur only if they are

profitable for both parties involved.

Becker allowed nonmonetary elements, like romantic love and companionship, to be

entered into courtship's profit and loss statement. And children, in particular, were

important. "Sexual gratification, cleaning, feeding and other services can be purchased,

but not children: Both the man and the woman are required to produce their own children

and perhaps to raise them," he wrote.

But back to whores: Edlund and Korn admit that spouses and streetwalkers aren't

exactly alike. Wives, in truth, are superior to whores in the economist's sense of being

a good whose consumption increases as income rises -- like fine wine. This may explain

why prostitution is less common in wealthier countries. But the implication remains that

wives and whores are -- if not exactly like Coke and Pepsi -- something akin to champagne

and beer. The same sort of thing.

As with Becker, a key differentiator in Edlund and Korn's model is reproductive sex.

Wives can offer it, whores can not.

To be fair, Edlund and Korn were merely building an admittedly grossly simplified model of

human behavior in an attempt to answer a nagging question: Why do hookers make so much

money? Prostitution is, seemingly, a low-skill but high-pay profession with few upfront costs,

micro-miniskirts and stiletto heels aside.

Yet according to data assembled from a wide variety of times and places, ranging from

mid-15th-century France to Malaysia of the late 1990s, prostitutes make more money -- in some

cases, a lot more money -- than do working girls who, well, work for a living. This held true

even for places where prostitution is legal and relatively safe. In short, streetwalkers aren't

necessarily being paid more for their increased risk of going to jail or the hospital.

Notwithstanding Jerry Hall's quip when she was married to Mick Jagger, about being "a maid

in the living room and a ####### in the bedroom," one normally cannot be both a wife and a

#######. "Combine this with the fact that marriage can be an important source of income for

women, and it follows that prostitution must pay better than other jobs to compensate for the

opportunity cost of forgone-marriage market earnings," Edlund and Korn conclude.

Ouch.

Another zinger: "This begs the question of why married men go to prostitutes (rather than

buying from their wives, who presumably will be low-cost providers, considering that they can

sell nonreproductive sex without compromising their marriage)." Guys, nothing says "Happy

Valentine's Day" more than "low-cost provider."

Of course, it's easy to pour cold water on some of the assumptions made in Edlund and Korn's

mathematical model. But these so-called "stylized facts" are supposed to predict human

behavior; they don't necessarily pretend to mirror it.

In particular, the assumption that there is no "third way" between wife and ####### is

problematic, if not outright offensive: "The third alternative, working in a regular job but not

marrying, can be ruled out, since we assume that the only downside of marriage for a woman

is the forgone opportunity for prostitution."

Be sure to let all your married friends know what they're missing.

Also, the emphasis on the utility of children is puzzling. In most Western democracies, fertility

rates have plummeted as wealth has increased. Empirically, men not only buy fewer whores

as they get richer, but they have fewer children.

Still, the economic analysis of marriage explains one age-old phenomenon: gold digging.

"In particular, does our analysis justify the popular belief that more beautiful, charming and

talented women tend to marry wealthier and more successful men?" wrote Becker.

His answer: "A positive sorting of nonmarket traits with nonhuman wealth always, and with

earnings power, usually, maximizes commodity output over all marriages."

In other words, yes, supermodels do prefer aging billionaires. And Gary Becker proved it

mathematically decades before The Donald married Melania.

Source

Well, I think there is soemthing to link SOME wives to prostitutes....not all, mind you.

You can't turn a hoe into a housewife.