[media-credit name=”Matthew B Brady – Library of Congress – Public Domain Images” align=”alignleft” width=”363″][/media-credit]

We all sell ourselves for Money

I want everyone to take a moment and think about exactly what they do for a living. I want you to think about how you make money to get the things you want in life. Think about how much money you make. Think about how much time you spend at work. Now, unless the answer is, “I’m the king of Spain. My money comes from a magic leprechaun, it is infinite and immediate.” Chances are, you, like me, are not even a cheap prostitute.

According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics,the average American makes $24,672 per year. If you run the numbers, you’ll find that (rounding to the nearest penny) equals $11.86 per hour. That is just breaking it down into the forty hour work week. But, we sell off more of our time and bodies that that. Add in the average 26 minute commute, and we’re suddenly working 45 hours a week, that’s down to $10.54 per hour. The average commute is also 16 miles, at an average cost of $0.30 per mile, or spending $2,496.00 per year, bringing us down to $9.48 per hour. Not to even mention the tax burden.

By comparison, the average street-level prostitute makes $30-$40 per hour, and for no other reason than this, we should legalize it. Who doesn’t want to get paid 3 to 4 times the national average. Well, there is they whole, pesky, “likely to be raped, beaten, robbed and arrested” thing. Most of that goes away with legalization and regulation. Throw in decreased spread of STDs for good measure.

Of course, like most of the laws that prevent someone from doing something generally harmless, laws against prostitution are unconstitutional and damaging to American society as a whole, and have no basis for their existence that can’t be tracked directly back to a religious institution. Really, that should be the only reason we need to legalize prostitution. Then maybe, just maybe, a few of our lawmakers won’t be such giant hypocrites. This of course says nothing for the additional $18.7 in income tax revenue that would be created by federal legalization of prostitution.

I suppose that the only reason not to legalize prostitution is because those of us working our asses off for $9.48 per hour would probably resent prostitutes for making more money than us. I’ve never really believed that it was a good idea to punish anyone just because they had earned more than you, no matter how they earned it.