2013 State Ratings on Human Trafficking Laws

The Polaris Project has rated all 50 states and the District of Columbia based on 10 categories of laws that are critical to a basic legal framework that combats human trafficking, punishes traffickers and supports survivors. 39 states passed new laws fighting human trafficking in the past year and as of July 31st they were rated (Tier 1). The states of New Jersey and Washington have perfect scores, meaning that they have governmental laws the fulfill all 10 categories and large improvements have been made to Arkansas, Wyoming, Mississippi, and New Jersey. Ratings are showing that 32 States have passed significant laws to combat Human Trafficking and should continue to take additional steps to improve and implement its laws(Tier 1), 11 States and DC have passed numerous laws to combat human trafficking (Tier 2), 6 States have made nominal efforts to improves laws to combat human trafficking and should take major steps{Tier 3) , and 1 state has not made legal effort to enact a basic legal framework to combat Human Trafficking and should actively work to improve Laws.
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FACT: Slaves today are seen as disposable commodities

How does Historical Slavery Compare to Modern Slavery? Today the life of a slave is often equated to that of mere dollars. Today people are comparatively cheaper than they were in the 1600-1800s. Prices for modern-day slaves are at an all time low, while profits remain high. Now ownership tends to last only a few months to a few years, making slaves cheaper to purchase and more easily disposable. In 1850 the purchase price of a slave in the southern US averaged the equivalent of $40,000 today. According to Free the Slaves, a slave today costs an average of $90. People have become a disposable commodity, cheap and easy labor one can just toss out when no longer needed. Globalization and the post-World War II population boom have increased access to, and lowered the cost of, transportation, which has in turn contributed to the increased levels of global slavery. Victims are often driven into slavery by severe poverty or acute need for economic gain. Additionally, the ethnicity of today’s slave is rarely important, however age and gender all too often are and thus women and children make up the majority of modern slavery victims.

Turning Demands into Offenses

Unofficial flag of Northern Ireland

 According to The Guardian, a new legislative proposal in Northern Ireland may turn the demand for prostitution and sexual services into offenses punishable by law. So what does this mean? It means that paying for sex could become illegal. 

Introduced by Democratic Unionist Lord Morrow, reasons for the proposal include "those who have been trafficked and sent to Northern Ireland are pushed into the sex trade." It would also eliminate the issue of the difficulty in differentiating between coerced victims of trafficking and willing participants. 

Official flag of Northern Ireland

Currently, "activities such as kerb-crawling, pimping and brothel-keeping are illegal in the UK." Kerb-crawling occurs when someone parks or drives slowly in an area, seeking to have sex with prostitutes or other women. The bill has to go through public consultation and it has to have enough cross-party supporters in the Stormont chamber, one of the locations where Northern Ireland's parliament conducts its business. 

Lord Morrow hopes that in eliminating the demand for such services, the supply will eventually fade away. 

What do you think about the idea of cutting the demand for prostitutes and sexual services in order to cut the supply? Do you support or oppose this idea? What do you suppose may be a better form of action?

The Cost of Demand

In 2005 Shared Hope International conducted a studied in four separate countries (United States, Netherlands, Jamaica and Japan) to investigate the impact of demand on woman and child who are victims of commercial sex trafficking.  It then turned their results into a 30 minute video titled DEMAND.  It's findings?  Without demand, the 2 million that are currently victims would no longer exist.    But while the solution is seemingly obvious, its implementation is difficult to  incomprehensible. How do we eradicate something that, according to the DEMAND, is affecting every major center, every major city in the United States?

In order to understand demand, one must look not only at the "consumer," but also the seller.  In his article "Understanding the Demand", Kevin Bales reveals that "slaves today are cheaper than at any other time in history."  Whether it's due to an increasingly desperation among third world populations, or high population counts, trafficking people is surpassing drugs and weapons in profits.  Not only is it profitable, but the risk is relatively low cost.  Bales discusses how difficult it is to penetrate what he calls the "wholesale chain."  The web of recruiters, transporters and traffickers is so complex and varying that it's difficult to disrupt them.  This provides a relative safety net for traffickers.  Low cost + low risk = high demand.

The high demand comes not just from the low risk for the seller, but from the low risk to the buyer as well.  There is a legal sex market in the United States with strip clubs, peep shoes and pornography, but Demand says that even legal businesses can become fronts for trafficking by turning a blind eye.  It's close to impossible to ensure that all girls in these venues are "free" and many times, they are underage.

On paper this all makes sense, but it's in reality that things get complicated.  How do we tell the difference? How do we separate the victims from those seeking this lifestyle?  The most basic answer? Education.  If the public chooses to become aware of the issue of modern slavery and learn how to identify victims, this will lead to an increase in reports and apprehensions by authorities."  As Bales puts it: "an increase in risk to the perpetrator will decrease the demand."  Education will also decrease the likelihood that society will be able to rationalize the activity of buying trafficked people.  A strongly negative public attitude toward trafficking would make it prohibitive to buying sex, just for the fact that the consequences for the "product" to be a trafficked woman or child would be so high.  The stronger the attitude, the higher the prosecutions, argues Bales.

Take the first step to saving trafficked women and children buy watching DEMAND and then sharing it with friends and family.  By creating awareness about the cost of buying sex, we can create a force that will lead to better victim identification and international cooperation.  Make the pledge to end demand.