413047-Underground-Commercial-Sex-Economy

All you’d say is ‘We need your help.’ It only happened twice. The client was getting aggressive. The pimp
just beat them up” (E1). While active interference was not routine, pimps made their presence felt. A pimp
explained, “I’d be at bars just waiting for them to finish doing what they doing. Walking in the mall with
them or behind them. Whatever we doing for the day, I’m close around” (D7).
While pimps in this study stressed their role protecting employee safety, past research has explored the
rates of violence experienced by sex workers with pimps and sex workers without pimps. The sex workers
in Levitt and Venkatesh’s (2007) study reported violence at the hand of either their pimp or client at least
once a month. Because pimp violence was significantly higher than client violence, the rate of violence
suffered by sex workers with pimps ultimately negated any differences in client violence between sex
workers who did and did not have a pimp. There is disagreement over whether pimps ultimately protect
sex workers from client violence, with some studies finding the affirmative and others finding the contrary
(Norton-Hawk 2004). Without speaking to the individuals employed by respondents for this study, it is
not possible to know the violence perpetrated by respondents against the individuals they pimped, nor if
pimp-initiated violence was higher than client-initiated violence against sex workers.
The role of a pimp was not a clearly structured position requiring concrete hours or an established set of
job duties. Pimping allowed for a great deal of freedom. Not surprisingly, respondents varied greatly in
their perception of the difficulty of their jobs and the duties it entailed; some pimps emphasized the
challenges of maintaining the business, while others felt they did little to sustain their businesses and
were able to collect money after “doing nothing.” Not all pimps provided the day-to-day operations
identified by Levitt and Venkatesh. In fact, pimps reported that their employees routinely posted their
own advertisements, received calls from customers, and transported themselves to dates. Some
respondents described going days or weeks without speaking to their employees, and reported that they
gave employees liberty to determine fees. Pimping often occurs with little evidence of direct, hands-on
management by pimps over employees. In some cases, pimps delegated duties to their bottom.
Bottom
You want a bottom girl, head bitch or head ho, who runs everything when you’re out of
town and knows how to do everything a pimp does. Once you get a bottom girl, it comes
automatic. (D5)
Thirty percent of respondents reported working with a bottom. Two pimps described their bottom as a
business partner, rather than employee. Bottoms completed a variety of different jobs within the business
structure, and explanations of the role of a bottom varied across respondents. However, respondents had
a bottom generally agreed that bottoms were experienced sex workers, carried some management duties,
had a high level of knowledge about the business, and often had worked with the pimp for a longer period
of time than other employees. In some cases, the bottom was also the mother of the pimp’s child/children.
One respondent explained that his bottom was the most knowledgeable employee that worked for him:
I had one girl who has been around for a long time—8 years. She was the bottom. The
bottom is the girl who has the most knowledge of the game, and knows how to get the
most money. She understands the way the pimp runs thing. She doesn’t run shit or do
shit. It is a privilege for her. A pimp trusts a bottom a little more than other girls, but she
could be his worst nightmare. (C9)
For some pimps, bottoms trained new employees: “[The bottom] initially booked dates for the new girl.
She taught … girls how to book their own dates” (D18). Another respondent explained the training duties
of a bottom: “If a female was fairly new, depends on how long [she has been] engaged in prostitution, my
bottom might help her out a bit and show her how a call is done” (B3). A woman who worked as a bottom
similarly explained, “[I would tell them] words they should use, how they should carry themselves, and
how to protect themselves” (D21).
Other pimps tasked their bottoms with multiple administrative and supervision duties involved in the
management of a multi-employee business. Daily activities completed by bottoms could include “getting
[the other women] up, making sure they were dressed right and on time for stuff. Picking them up” (E16).
Some respondents also saw the role of the bottom as someone who ensured that employees were content:
“Her role was just basically to keep all the girls happy, make them feel welcome. My role was to oversee
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