Alex Tabarrok has a post on changes in the porn industry. I was particularly interested in this line:
"Free porn is killing the professional industry reports Louis Theroux in the Guardian: 'Fees for scenes, not surprisingly, have taken a hit.
“Some girls get $600 [£390] for a scene now,” the retired performer JJ
Michaels tells me. “It might be $900-$1,000 for a big-name girl. It used
to get up to $3,000.” For guys, rates can be $150 or lower.'"
A lot of my research at the Urban Institute was on labor market disparities, so this piqued my interest. I can think of two reasons for this: (1.) compensating differentials, and (2.) differential marginal productivity.
My prior is that women require higher compensating differentials in this line of work than men, for reasons of reputation, health, and preference. But I also bet a marginally more talented woman would bring in more revenue than a marginally more talented man, given the typical audience. So the question is, assuming there's no gender discrimination involved here, how much of the disparity is attributable to each factor (and are there other factors?).
And as an empirically oriented guy, how would one test for this? I would think natural experiments around the introduction of new STD drugs, or perhaps using the initial news about HIV in the 80s could help. Maybe interstate differentials in certification would help (although that would introduce selection effects) - I assume because of the age of consent issues in this industry there's probably a range of stringency in certification. One could imagine gay porn as a control to differentiate marginal productivity, but that probably wouldn't work since the markets are surely going to be different. Perhaps multiple partner scenarios could help to get a sense of the differential diminishing marginal returns associated with adding more men or more women (although I imagine there are important cross-elasticities associated with this that could complicate things).
Other ideas?
There's a dissertation waiting here for anyone that's interested.
Thursday, June 7, 2012
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Well, there's a dissertation waiting for an interested scholar, but there's also a tinge of amusement I can't resist suppressing! XD
ReplyDelete"a tinge of amusement I can't resist"
DeleteDon't worry Blue Aurora, that tinge is perfectly natural. Just use the appropriate precautions.
Maybe the reputation factor could be evaluated (at least on the entry-level) by setting up anonymous, semi-pro straight scenes that, for example, portray geek fantasies such as Batman getting it on with Harley Quinn - both wearing their full costumes, of course. Good luck getting a research grant for that one :)
ReplyDeleteYou joke, but actually through the GWU economics department listserv we once got an email directing us to a request by the publishers of Hustler. They were looking for an economist to do work on the contribution of adult publications to the economy. If I remember, this was at the very beginning of the crisis. I'm guessing some legislature somewhere was on a moral crusade and they wanted ammo justifying themselves.
DeleteNot that that sort of thing is widely funded, I'm sure, but it is an interesting question with interesting empirical possibilities (economists LOVE clever empirical papers). Who knows.
While we're talking about compensating differentials, I should note that some grad students may find reviewing hours of porn intrinsically valuable, so they may not require as much grant support.
"If I remember, this was at the very beginning of the crisis."
DeleteAround that time, Larry Flynt ran a jokey campaign for a government bailout of the porn industry. I'll bet that was behind Hustler's request.
Supposedly in the liquidity trap money and bonds become close substitutes. We are allegedly in the liquidity trap now, so I'd like someone to do an experiment to check this. Here is my proposed method....
ReplyDelete1. Buy some bonds.
2. Go to a strip club.
3. Stuff them down the g-strip of a stripper.
4. See what happens.
You're on fire lately Current!
DeleteHold on a second... this can't go without wide broadcasting.
Email (or google) Alex Padilla. He is an Austrian guy that did some work on this. I think he actually paid grad students to watch these movies and take notes on something he was running a regression on. (I'm being serious.)
ReplyDelete