The Politics of Prostitution

By: Corbin Smith

Currently, Nevada is the only U.S state with legal prostitution. Julia Burke was inspired to write Bill H-O-11 by Nevada’s legislation and “a big push to protect the women and men that work in this industry which has significantly higher rates of murder, assault, and missing persons cases than any other job field in America.”

The bill seeks to solve many issues regarding sexual violence. Burke proposed that the bill would “not only prevent these crimes from happening, both to workers and customers, but also significantly decrease the rates of both STDs and human trafficking.”

This bill is meant to help decrease illegal activity as well as the STD rate, in Illinois. With an “Increasingly sex-positive culture”, the STD rates could rise higher than they currently are which is one thing this bill helps to stop

Burke described more advantages of the bill, like creating economic booms, funnelling money into government programs, and incentivizing through income tax. Taxes and the license fee would help put money into programs like sex education in schools. According to the logic of the bill, if prostitution were to be legalized, schools would not encourage students to pursue a career in prostitution. If prostitution were to be legalized, the government would distribute licenses to workers who pay for them. 

This bill could positively affect our state by lowering crime rates, the spread of STDs through prostitution, and has potential for economic advantages. However, it unsurprisingly faced criticism.

The bill was passed and amended in the Senate, but ultimately failed in the Orange Senate.