Time for the Strippers to unionize?

...misclassifying dancers as independent contractors to avoid paying minimum wage, overtime...

What does "The women are not allowed to work at competing clubs." mean? Do these women have contracts with the clubs they work at? What do the contracts specify?

I'm trying to figure out why these women don't leave if they feel like they're being treated badly. If the clubs decide that they're losing too much business they'll have to negotiate, right?

No, I doubt people go to strip clubs for alcohol either. But I don't go to McDonalds for the soda - guess what they're largely in the business of selling? Sure other stuff makes them a profit, but nothing like soda does. Just because that's not the reason people go doesn't mean that isn't their main business.

And while yes, that isn't very respectful to the dancers, that doesn't make it any less true - just like in a sports bar where the draw is the game on a big tv or a pool hall where the draw is, well, pool the strippers are the draw at a strip club. The industry itself lacks respect for the women (and men) involved (for the most part) - it's systematic, not isolated to this club

@TheOrtega: Strippers Local 80085?

@supercereal: You're missing the point. They're not complaining about not making minimum wage, they're complaining about having to pay to work. And they're paying a lot more than they used to.

I know more than I care to admit about this profession, and on a bad night, you can actually leave with less than you came in with.

I just have to say...that is quite a picture!

@supercereal: Places that don't pay minimum wage usually don't follow many of the other rules in place to protect workers, these dancers may not have been overly concerned with the $5.35/hr but probably are concerned with all the other illegal things they were doing.
Many places in NYC that don't pay employees on the books use that to their advantage by taking advantage of their employees in any and every way possible.
Your quote actually sounds like some of the club owners I've met.
"My employees make all kinds of money, therefore they should put up with whatever I feel like doing to them."
-Pay the manager out of your tips, forced pooling of tips, pay for walk outs/breakages, etc the list goes on and on.

@Shoelace: The women aren't paid by the clubs. The club charges the dancers a percentage of the tips patrons give them, as a fee to allow the dancer to dance there. The dancers are complaining that the clubs are raising the percentage, without raising the benefits they offer as employers.

As for the exclusivity contract, it cuts down on competition, and allows the club to advertise that only they have this dancer or that dancer.

I would think the main business is the business that brings in the most customers and is bringing in the largest amount of revenue. Most strip joints have a cover charge and I don't know many guys/girls who will pay a cover at a regular bar( I'm talking about a bar not a regular dance club) just to drink.

So if the ta-tas and booty cheeks are making the most money and bringing in the customers then they're in the business of ta-tas and booty cheeks.

Most girls don't want to switch clubs because they build up repeat customers after being in a club for a while. If they just up and leave they are really starting over which means they take the hit money wise.

Most dancers don't hand out business cards with a contact number so regulars have no idea where the girl is working when she moves on.

@supercereal: Can you really complain about your workers suing you while you're making fistfuls of likely-unreported-as-income cash selling overpriced drinks and charging your employees for the privilege of working for you?

Strippers don't really make as money as the guys complaining about the price of lap dances would like to believe.

This is SOP for strip clubs - treat your employees like crap and figure they won't complain. Then profess shock and amazement at the idea that "but they're just hos!" doesn't cut much ice when you commit wage and hour violations.

I truly don't understand the business model of US strip clubs. Pay them minimum wage and let them keep tips and you can still make buckets of money, and you get the best dancers wanting to work at your club. But I guess it helps if you're not a greedy idiot.

@AreYouConfusedYet?HowAboutNow?: COTD.

@Difdi: Most clubs charge a fee to dance for the night, from 50 to upwards of $300 in the best clubs. Don't cover your fee, you're in the hole. It's not a good place to be.

@TheOrtega:
I believe there's already an exotic dancers union. I dunno if they're in Massachusetts, though.

@changed my name: That's the "Peep Show" installation from Museum of Sex in NYC.

@Sheogorath: I know San Francisco was one of the first strip clubs where the performers unionized. I hope they branched out. Some are incredibly exploited and more than a few end up with not much to show for it by the time their expiration date hits.

@mythago: Yup. If the mob doesn't own them outright, then the owners are wannabes. Either way, tax cheats, employee sharks, etc.
It's funny when Conservatives support mobbed-up establishments, however.

@mythago: You forgot "misogynist" and "coke-abusing assh*le gumba wannabe", but besides that, pretty much to the point.

What part of its anatomy is the pink bunny using to grip the pole, because I don't think it's using its thighs...

@coren: Your comparison would only make sense if McDonald's was selling soda and letting other people come in to sell the burgers. At McDonald's, the restaurant clearly relies on both the food AND the drinks to satisfy customers. Strip clubs rely on both the dancers AND the drinks to satisfy their customers too.

So if they're not employees, and they get injured in the club, they can sue the same as any patron, and not be limited by workers comp, right?

I know a few strippers, and while they are treated poorly by the club owners, they often make very good money. Enough that they dont quit. One of the girls I knew would only work 5 nights a month as a striper and could make her rent, she then worked as a hostess the other nights at the club, where she also made very good money. In total maybe working 15 or 17 nights a month. She seemed happy enough doing it and liked the money and was in school at the time so the scheduling worked out well.

@Shoelace: Also they do shady things in the contracts liek if you are sick you owe them 600 dollars for the night you missed. Thats what happened to my neighbor who strips and got the flu for a week. She was in debt with them for like 1800 dollars. I'm sure they would have trouble enforcing it if she just quit on them.

Is it me or is that yellow peep winking at me??

This "profession" needs to disappear completely. Every time my state of residence is in the news it's something I'm ashamed of being associated with.

If women feel compelled to dance naked in front of a bunch of grimy men who view them as sex objects and nothing more, the economy is in worse shape than I thought.

I hope the lawsuit fails so that these women, whoever they are, will feel obligated to choose a better line of work.

@DovS: It doesn't matter who provides the entertainment/burgers (and they are paid by the club so it's not entirely someone else selling the burgers). The writer suggested no one goes to a strip club for booze - and that's fine. Who goes to a fast food joint for their soda? You go for the strippers or for the fast food, not the drinks. It just so happens that the drinks are the big money makers.

@GuinevereRucker: Back in the day, I quit work as a bank teller to be a stripper because the working conditions, attitude of management, behavior of customers and pay were all way better. But thanks for putting your own warm, self-indulgent glow above other people's well-being.

@xtc46 - thinksmarter on twitter: Imagine how good the money would be if they weren't getting ripped off by their bosses. If a senior IT guy found out that his boss was siphoning off his paycheck illegally, I doubt he would say "Well, I do make six figures, so why should I complain? I have plenty of money."

@mythago: I don't respect your decision at all. It was foolish, and there were any number of other jobs you could have sought.

If that opinion offends you because you were a stripper, I'm sorry. But that entire industry needs to be shut down. We need more men in the world that will take responsibility for a family, take care of their wives, and be faithful - not men who hang around in strip joints ogling naked women.

By being a stripper, prostitute, or whatever you call it, I believe you actually do *harm* to people.

I wish someone could define what is and is not contract labor. My previous workplace paid me as a contractor but I don't think that was right. Thankfully I don't work there anymore, but I did for four years.

Oh, and I wasn't stripping. Lol

@GuinevereRucker: Wishing unemployment on someone not necessarily deserving is bad enough when the economy is good. It's downright mean now that the economy is bad. I doubt anyone gives a flying fark about your embarrassment over your state of residence.

I hope more bad things about your state hit the news, so you, whoever you are, will feel obligated to choose a better one.

@Trai_Dep: I believe that part would be the "marsh" of the Peep. The "mallow" is a little lower and to the left.

@Kimaroo - 20% More Kitty Added!: Here are the rules set up by the IRS (they are the ones who care the most about this): [www.irs.gov]

In general, if you only service only client, if the employer tells you when to show up and how to do your work, provides you equipment to go the job and controls your work -- you are an employee.

@Kimaroo - 20% More Kitty Added!: I'd imagine a Brazilian Wax would get quite sticky. Quickly.

@Kimaroo - 20% More Kitty Added!: I always confuse those two.

@GuinevereRucker: Your opinion is not informed or intelligent enough for me to be offended by it.

You seem to believe the world of men is sharply divided into two groups: responsible, 1950s-style family men who would never dream of ogling women, and irresponsible cads who drool over naked ladies - and if only we get rid of strip bars, the latter group will quietly shuffle off and become the former. What an adorable fantasy!

And to feed this fantasy, you want women who often have very few other choices (did you think all these strippers dropped out of medical school, or are Trustafarians?) to take work that pays and treats them worse, purely so that you can convince yourself that all men would be really nice people if it weren't for the goddamned whores running around.

Being a sex worker means getting paid for what in normal life, women are expected to put up with for free. Maybe that's what's really got your goat.

@GuinevereRucker: It's America and people are entitled to do what they damn well please. If you don't like it, then don't reward them with your patronage.
THAT said, the workers are often screwed. Much of the "ills" ascibed to the profession are the result of the skeezy owners, not the dancers. So if it's these aspects that grate on you, then you should work together with the workers to ensure they have a clean, safe, non-exploitive working environment. That way, everyone benefits.

@coren: Sigh. Way to miss the point. The club is trying to pretend that the naked women are not the reason that people come to the bar, and that their legal status is no different than that of a wide-screen TV. This is really a dumbass legal argument, but their lawyer had to say SOMETHING other than "Damn, you got us."

@H3ion: I think you would see a magical transformation in their status if that happened.

@GuinevereRucker: Wow.
First off: there's a BIG difference between strippers and prostitutes.

Second off: Sex work is one of the oldest professions in the world. Just because it doesn't jibe with your own personal moral sensibilities doesn't mean you get to dictate where it should go and what it should do. It's survived every permutation of society we've had from cavemen through the Romans through Medieval times all the way up to today. It's not going anywhere.

Third off: Keep in mind that the women who do this kind of work choose to. Wrap your tiny little mind around that, if you can. There is nobody keeping these women (and men for what it's worth) tied up in a basement in between acts, nothing stopping them from changing professions, they all choose to be there.

Know what's ridiculous and needs to be outlawed? The distortion and shame we place on our own bodies and emotions regarding anything of a sexual nature. People like you propagate the fear and shame that any natural urge or desire we have is nasty and needs to be hidden and suppressed. It's that kind of thinking that leads people to be unfaithful to each other in relationships instead of being honest. It's that kind of backwards attitude and head-in-the-sand thinking that keeps these women working for seedy back-alley strip joints because it's the only place they can get work, instead of in places where the rules are followed and enforced. I could hijack the thread and relate this to the "war on drugs" but I won't.

I also know that I can't change your teeny weeny little walnut mind, but just know that you have no idea what you're talking about and the world is a better place without you.

DIAF,
Queue.

@Trai_Dep: I'd say it has something to do with needlessly Puritanical laws, too. There are lots of countries where sex work is largely legal and well-regulated, and *they* aren't falling apart at the seams because of their loose morals. It's like Carlin used to say. "Selling is legal. F*cking is legal. Why isn't selling f*cking legal?"

I'd compare it to Prohibition, or the War on Drugs. There will always be some portion of society that wants to look at naked people. So you can either provide a clean, safe, well-regulated environment for it, or you can force it into back rooms, where owners can exploit the workers with relative impunity, as regularly happens to illegal immigrants.

@mythago: I get the point - but how much money does the club making from putting on strip shows? Just because people come to see the naked dancers doesn't mean that's what the club's main business is - why would they consider their "main business" to be anything other than their most profitable? They're not denying that the women are an attraction, they are in fact the main attraction - but their comparison to sports bars and pool halls is valid. But like I said, they still treat their performers shitty - but that's the entire industry. Which is no excuse, but they're not any worse scum than the rest of em. (for the most part, I'm sure there's some ethical strip club somewhere)

@Sanveann: What point am I missing? If they don't like the conditions, whatever they are, they can be looking elsewhere. If a dance club is changing contract terms around (assuming there's a contract) then the strippers can accept them or not.

If the clubs are struggling because of the economy and are trying to make up some of the loss by taking more from the strippers, the strippers can leave. I think the clubs would find themselves at a much greater loss without the strippers and would ultimately need to convince them to come back by offering better terms.

@Shoelace: If they all have same rules that exploit workers, then where else will they go? This was why unions were created in the first place.

She is going to have a hard time getting past she has been 'paying club owners $10 or $20 for the right to perform each night' for about 15 years.

But a quick suggestion for the strippers, since he says that the 'main business' is serving alcohol, tell your patrons about you working conditions. Assemble a small union between workers and strike someway. The owner may not go too long without cracking. But most importantly, again, tell your patrons. Have them speak for you.

@RandomHookup: Thanks for that. I basically got screwed for 4 years, which is what I figured. I wish my husband didn't still work there so I could feel comfortable filing that form against my old boss. My husband does seem to really be contract for the most part, so that's good.

@mythago: I am going to offer a different point of view, just for fun. Strip clubs often charge higher prices for drinks, and get away with it because they offer a service that most don't. The women show up and show a little bit of skin, and guys throw money at them for the cheap thrill of seeing some live nudity without the added benefit of getting to score. Basically, the business model is designed to encourage uninhibited spending of its patrons by exploiting the most primal of urges. I would argue that strip clubs are more exploitation of guys, and less exploitation of women.

@Shoelace: I'm betting it's more like "it's ok, we had 15 secretaries, accountants and computer programmers out of work and desperate to feed their families come in and apply this week, have fun trying to find another job to make ends meet for your family."

Because the economy is bad, they probably have more women willing to strip. It's a job you can jump right into, no 2 - 4 year degree required. People out of work right now don't have the reserves to go to school before they take a job, and are thus pretty limited.