Every transaction has a price, but for sex work, the biggest cost isn't the money exchanged; it's the spiritual and physical toll of constant threats and social stigma.

This week, we delve into the calculated realities of sex work: exploring how it often provides greater financial autonomy and time flexibility to meet basic human needs, from feeding a family to managing a chronic illness, compared to the exploitation found in typical minimum wage jobs.

We'll dissect the global policy debate, expose institutional hypocrisy, and examine the real outcomes of decriminalization, highlighting how New Zealand sex workers report feeling safer, accessing fundamental rights, and gaining protection from police abuse. We'll also confront the psychological devastation of criminalization, exploring how constant policing pushes workers into isolated, dangerous environments, increasing the risks of violence, exploitation, and HIV/STI infection.

One host analyzes the flawed "rescue" narrative and how systems like the Nordic Model betray marginalized individuals, amplifying risks for migrant and queer workers already facing stigma. The other host asks: What is the true cost the psychological debt, the constant fear of eviction or job loss when society denies the legitimacy of their work and uses that illegality to justify abuse?

This episode is about human survival, structural inequality, and why governments that tolerate this industry while criminalizing its workers are primary perpetrators of harm.

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