Hello Friends,
Tim Harford, a columnist at the Financial Times, has written two very interesting or one can say intriguing books on Economic, The Undercover Economist, and The Logic of Life (The rational economics of an irrartional world). His books have been praised by Nobel laureates, and help even the ordinary folks understand some difficult concepts.
In, The Logic of Life he has discussed various rationales of certain sexual behaviors.
I share an extract that discussed the economic risks and rewards of unprotected sex, that includes the behavior of SPs as well as the clients. It is a discussion on Mexican prostitutes in Mexico, but equally applies elsewher
I am sharing it in the Lounge and some of the Terbites may find it worth reading. It is shared in 2 Parts. To Read Part 1 please click here:
https://terb.cc/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=2230457#post2230457
The ISBN for the book is: 978-0-385-66387-8 (Random House Canada).
Thanks.
--------------
This may be hard to believe, but alternative explanations for the un¬safe sex do not stand up well. Condoms are cheap and they`re easy to find around Morelia: Most risky sex takes place with a condom available but unused. Fewer than 2 percent of sexual transactions are bareback for the prosaic reason that there are no condoms on hand.
It`s tempting to argue that the prostitutes do not understand the risks. That`s patronizing: Even without the efforts of the health and de¬velopment organizations, prostitutes probably know more about the risks of sexually transmitted infections than anyone who thinks of them as simpleminded victims. In fact, the prostitutes know that while the risks are real, they are modest. Only one in eight hundred Mexicans car¬ries HIV, and even among prostitutes it afflicts just one in three hun-dred. Even if a prostitute is unlucky enough that one of her unprotected jobs is with a man who is HIV-positive, the risk that she will catch it is less than 2 percent if one of them is carrying some other sexual infec¬tion and less than 1 percent otherwise. None of the prostitutes wants to catch HIV, but the risks of catching it because of one instance of unpro¬tected sex are small, while the pay is substantially higher. Wouldn`t you notice a pay increase of 25 percent?
The risks prostitutes take when they leave the condom in their purses seem to be strikingly well judged. As far as we can tell, the typi¬cal Morelian prostitute is acting as though she valued one extra year of healthy life at between fifteen thousand and fifty thousand dollars or up to five years` income. The figure, calculated by economist Paul Gertler, relies on epidemiological data on the risk of getting sick, along with a World Health Organization measure called the "disability-adjusted life years," designed to estimate the suffering caused by different diseases.
Perhaps you`re thinking that a rational person would never risk his or her life for mere cash. But most of us know people whose jobs lead them to do exactly that. Consider Staff Sergeant Matthew Kruger. Kruger signed up for a third tour of duty in Iraq and headed to the front lines in December 2005, risking not only his life but his marriage, which had been badly strained by his absences. He`s not crazy. But he did risk his life for money: At the age of twenty-nine, with three small children, he simply needed the health insurance the army provided.
Staff Sergeant Kruger sounds like a brave man, but even a coward like me will risk his life for money. If I saw a fifty-dollar bill lying on the other side of a busy road, I`d cross over to pick it up. It`s not a big risk, but it is a risk nonetheless.
Far from being rash or stupid, the choices that young Mexican prostitutes are making are astonishingly similar to those made by work¬ers in rich countries who accept dangerous jobs in exchange for higher salaries—construction workers, lumberjacks, soldiers.
If Morelian prostitutes are being irrational in accepting extra cash in exchange for higher risks, then so are lumberjacks. It`s more likely that both the prostitutes and the lumberjacks know what they are doing: a tough, dangerous job that offers some financial compensations for doing it. They both have a degree of negotiating power, sensible preferences, and the same hard- edged view of the world. The difference is that the prostitutes are poorer and so they risk their lives for less.
The most disturbing thing about the decision of prostitutes to have risky sex is just how calculated it seems to be. All the sex-worker educa¬tion in the world is unlikely to change that decision: Unlike U.S. teenagers, the prostitutes already knew about the risks.
Some may find this analysis offensive and absurd. But it`s a case study in the use of economics to deal with a social problem. Now that we understand what is motivating the unsafe sex, we have a chance of doing something about it. The sex-worker education programs have had their uses, but since prostitutes now know about the risks, the peo¬ple who need to be educated are not the prostitutes, but their clients. That will not be easy.
Prostitutes are smarter about the risks of sexual infection than their clients, and that makes sense, because sexually transmitted infection is a daily occupational hazard for a prostitute but a small risk for a client, who will quite sensibly spend his time worrying about something else. It`s just like Professor List`s pin traders. The experienced traders (the girls) know what they`re doing. The inexperienced traders (some of their clients) do not. Yet again, we see rational behavior from those who have the strongest incentive to keep themselves informed. The clients remain. to use a piece of economic jargon, "rationally ignorant": It isn`t worth their time to find out more. (We`ll meet this concept again in chapter 8.)
It is very hard to see that changing, but it will certainly not change with¬out efforts directed straight at the men who hire prostitutes.
A trip to the seamy side of Morelia should make it clear that a ra¬tional world is not necessarily a wonderful one—something we`ll see time and again in this book. Rational individuals make many choices that are bad news for others; risky sex is just a particularly clear exam¬ple. And when rational individuals face a miserable set of choices, as do the Morelian prostitutes, they cannot do better than pick the best of a bad lot. We will not solve social problems if we pretend that they are caused only—or even mostly—by the mad, the stupid, and the morally degenerate. But nor should we shrug our shoulders and declare that all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds. I hope that this book will show that although people tend to make smart choices, it is possible to offer them better ones.
Tim Harford, a columnist at the Financial Times, has written two very interesting or one can say intriguing books on Economic, The Undercover Economist, and The Logic of Life (The rational economics of an irrartional world). His books have been praised by Nobel laureates, and help even the ordinary folks understand some difficult concepts.
In, The Logic of Life he has discussed various rationales of certain sexual behaviors.
I share an extract that discussed the economic risks and rewards of unprotected sex, that includes the behavior of SPs as well as the clients. It is a discussion on Mexican prostitutes in Mexico, but equally applies elsewher
I am sharing it in the Lounge and some of the Terbites may find it worth reading. It is shared in 2 Parts. To Read Part 1 please click here:
https://terb.cc/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=2230457#post2230457
The ISBN for the book is: 978-0-385-66387-8 (Random House Canada).
Thanks.
--------------
This may be hard to believe, but alternative explanations for the un¬safe sex do not stand up well. Condoms are cheap and they`re easy to find around Morelia: Most risky sex takes place with a condom available but unused. Fewer than 2 percent of sexual transactions are bareback for the prosaic reason that there are no condoms on hand.
It`s tempting to argue that the prostitutes do not understand the risks. That`s patronizing: Even without the efforts of the health and de¬velopment organizations, prostitutes probably know more about the risks of sexually transmitted infections than anyone who thinks of them as simpleminded victims. In fact, the prostitutes know that while the risks are real, they are modest. Only one in eight hundred Mexicans car¬ries HIV, and even among prostitutes it afflicts just one in three hun-dred. Even if a prostitute is unlucky enough that one of her unprotected jobs is with a man who is HIV-positive, the risk that she will catch it is less than 2 percent if one of them is carrying some other sexual infec¬tion and less than 1 percent otherwise. None of the prostitutes wants to catch HIV, but the risks of catching it because of one instance of unpro¬tected sex are small, while the pay is substantially higher. Wouldn`t you notice a pay increase of 25 percent?
The risks prostitutes take when they leave the condom in their purses seem to be strikingly well judged. As far as we can tell, the typi¬cal Morelian prostitute is acting as though she valued one extra year of healthy life at between fifteen thousand and fifty thousand dollars or up to five years` income. The figure, calculated by economist Paul Gertler, relies on epidemiological data on the risk of getting sick, along with a World Health Organization measure called the "disability-adjusted life years," designed to estimate the suffering caused by different diseases.
Perhaps you`re thinking that a rational person would never risk his or her life for mere cash. But most of us know people whose jobs lead them to do exactly that. Consider Staff Sergeant Matthew Kruger. Kruger signed up for a third tour of duty in Iraq and headed to the front lines in December 2005, risking not only his life but his marriage, which had been badly strained by his absences. He`s not crazy. But he did risk his life for money: At the age of twenty-nine, with three small children, he simply needed the health insurance the army provided.
Staff Sergeant Kruger sounds like a brave man, but even a coward like me will risk his life for money. If I saw a fifty-dollar bill lying on the other side of a busy road, I`d cross over to pick it up. It`s not a big risk, but it is a risk nonetheless.
Far from being rash or stupid, the choices that young Mexican prostitutes are making are astonishingly similar to those made by work¬ers in rich countries who accept dangerous jobs in exchange for higher salaries—construction workers, lumberjacks, soldiers.
If Morelian prostitutes are being irrational in accepting extra cash in exchange for higher risks, then so are lumberjacks. It`s more likely that both the prostitutes and the lumberjacks know what they are doing: a tough, dangerous job that offers some financial compensations for doing it. They both have a degree of negotiating power, sensible preferences, and the same hard- edged view of the world. The difference is that the prostitutes are poorer and so they risk their lives for less.
The most disturbing thing about the decision of prostitutes to have risky sex is just how calculated it seems to be. All the sex-worker educa¬tion in the world is unlikely to change that decision: Unlike U.S. teenagers, the prostitutes already knew about the risks.
Some may find this analysis offensive and absurd. But it`s a case study in the use of economics to deal with a social problem. Now that we understand what is motivating the unsafe sex, we have a chance of doing something about it. The sex-worker education programs have had their uses, but since prostitutes now know about the risks, the peo¬ple who need to be educated are not the prostitutes, but their clients. That will not be easy.
Prostitutes are smarter about the risks of sexual infection than their clients, and that makes sense, because sexually transmitted infection is a daily occupational hazard for a prostitute but a small risk for a client, who will quite sensibly spend his time worrying about something else. It`s just like Professor List`s pin traders. The experienced traders (the girls) know what they`re doing. The inexperienced traders (some of their clients) do not. Yet again, we see rational behavior from those who have the strongest incentive to keep themselves informed. The clients remain. to use a piece of economic jargon, "rationally ignorant": It isn`t worth their time to find out more. (We`ll meet this concept again in chapter 8.)
It is very hard to see that changing, but it will certainly not change with¬out efforts directed straight at the men who hire prostitutes.
A trip to the seamy side of Morelia should make it clear that a ra¬tional world is not necessarily a wonderful one—something we`ll see time and again in this book. Rational individuals make many choices that are bad news for others; risky sex is just a particularly clear exam¬ple. And when rational individuals face a miserable set of choices, as do the Morelian prostitutes, they cannot do better than pick the best of a bad lot. We will not solve social problems if we pretend that they are caused only—or even mostly—by the mad, the stupid, and the morally degenerate. But nor should we shrug our shoulders and declare that all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds. I hope that this book will show that although people tend to make smart choices, it is possible to offer them better ones.
