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I’m not much of an expert in feminist economics—-I count on my fingers—-but I can appreciate a visually interesting, sufficiently dumbed-down lady-graph when it comes my way. This week, my foray into quantitative analysis of feminist issues left me kinda down. Behold, graphical representations of Bad News in abortion and stripping:
Depressing Feminist Graph #1:
According to the Economist, safe abortions worldwide decreased markedly between 1995 and 2003. Unsafe abortions, though—-holding strong as ever! The good—-and totally obvious—-news is that banning and restricting abortion does not decrease abortions, so you might as well just make them legal and safe. In fact, in places where abortions are legal and safe, women have fewer safe abortions, too, probably because the contraception is flowin’ freely there as well. [Depressing Feminist Graph hat tip to Pukeimmediately].
Depressing Feminist Graph #2:
Unfortunately, when that contraception flows all the way into the strip club, it can have some negative economic effects for exotic dancers. The second depressing feminist graph comes courtesy of Julie Sunday, who notes a recent study which found that “women on the pill are attracted to more ‘boyish’ features in men.” The feminist blogs are all over the study’s more widely reported findings. But Sunday read, like, the whole fucking thing, and mined this interesting economic tidbit:
Strippers who are not taking the pill report an increase in lapdance revenue around ovulation whereas pill-taking strippers (who are thus not ovulating) do not see a spike in their revenue and earn less throughout the cycle. No, really.
Dotted line: strippers on the pill; solid line: strippers not on the pill.
Damn, girl. That’s a 50-dollar-per-shift difference during the menstrual cycle, and a full 200-dollar-per-shift-difference at the stripper’s most fertile. Somebody should do this study on women in other professions and see what they can shell up. Julie Sunday suggests that strippers looking for safety in the bedroom and success in the workplace ought to just go hormone-free, but not every type of contraception works for every woman. Would you change your method of contraception to get more tips?