COPS | Street Level

Street Prostitutes' Clients

Prostitution clients, typically referred to as "johns" or "tricks," are attracted to the illicit nature of the encounter, desire varieties of sex that regular partners do not provide, view sex as merely a commodity, and/or lack interest in or access to conventional relationships. Clients' decision to solicit a prostitute is influenced by the availability of prostitutes, knowledge of where to find them, access to money, perceived risk of getting caught or contracting disease, and ease of securing services. Clients gather such information in a variety of ways: from trial and error; from personal recommendations from others (including friends, bartenders, taxi drivers, and hotel workers); and, increasingly, from information posted on Internet websites. Somewhere around 10 to 20 percent of men admit they have paid for sex, but only about 1 percent pay for sex regularly. While this is still a large number of potential clients, it is considerably lower than some earlier estimates based on flawed research methods.