Selling Sex to Avoid a Financial Crisis
That’s what this reader did, in part, and she’s not ashamed of it:
I didn’t realize how lucky I am until I read Neal Gabler’s article, “The Secret Shame of Middle-Class Americans,” about the financial insecurity that apparently plagues most of them. At this moment I am a 46-year-old single woman who could indeed come up with $400 for an emergency, or even $2,000. But to reach this place of relative security, I broke all the rules and violated just about every norm of stereotypical middle-class life:
- I never married and never blended finances with a romantic partner.
- I never had kids.
- I never bought a home; I’ve rented apartments for 25 years.
- I never bought a new car; I buy cars directly from previous owners and pay in cash. (The most I’ve spent on a car is $4,800.)
- I financed college and graduate school on my own with a combination of scholarships, savings, loans, part-time work and careful use of time-limited 0% APR credit cards. Although I’ve proven piss-poor at earning big salaries, I am absolutely stellar at paying off debt, so my credit rating is in the high 700s.
Still with me? You won’t be:
Even after a Master’s degree, I didn’t earn enough at my primary job to cover rent, bills, and educational debt, so I took on a second job in my 30s. And that job was escorting. I had sex for money over a period of seven years.
And I make no apologies. Per hour, it’s still the highest wage I’ve ever earned. Rarely has a job been so uncomplicated or a transaction so forthright. I have self-defense skills—a must if you’re doing something as potentially-dangerous as independent sex work—but I never had to use them. Nor did I feel demeaned by the work or by my clients; if anything, it felt like I was taking advantage of them. I was paid ridiculous sums to do something I already enjoyed. Frankly, my only regret was that I didn’t think of it sooner!
Today I feel a great deal of freedom and relatively little financial worry, but that’s largely because I’ve said “no” to the things we’re supposed to want—home ownership, children, marriage, shiny consumer goods—and said “yes” to things we’re supposed to avoid. So I can’t help but wonder: Who made the rules that say owning a home is better than renting, new cars are better than used, and an exorbitantly-priced private-school education is better than a public college degree? Who benefits from our continued belief in these rules? Clearly, it’s not us.