I think the implication is that the sexual marketplace is inefficient (with an implied dig at the idea that employment is a right in the sense that you describe). Given roughly equal numbers of men and women who want sex and/or relationships, and treating men and women as fungible, there is an inefficiency if everybody isn’t satisfied, as partners can be rearranged to produce a greater number of satisfied people.
On the down side for this view, people aren’t in fact fungible. On the up side for this view, there are some obvious inefficiencies in the sexual marketplace, such as the distribution of genders across cities. On the “whatever” side for this view, I’m inclined to say that the root of the problem is that value on the sexual marketplace has greater variance for men than women, so the tails on both ends are dominated by men whose preferences cannot be satisfied, and the middle of the distribution has more women than there are men available to satisfy their preferences.
First, people are not fungible at all (outside of the fairly rare “any hole will do” approach and no, I don’t mean bisexuals).
Second, there is a lot of fuzziness about what’s actually being traded because under consideration is the whole spectrum from casual one-night stands to till death do us part. Notably when talking about the sex marketplace, what many people want is actually a relationship and that’s a bit different.
Third, there are difficulties because what you offer to exchange is not well-defined, partially hidden, and, to top it off, the participants have an incentive to lie about it.
Fourth, as you note, the market isn’t quite symmetric in that men and women have different needs, expectations, approaches, and techniques.
All in all, the market certainly isn’t perfect, but I don’t know if I would characterize the situation as a “market failure”. It’s just the usual human mess that most manage to muddle through.
I think the implication is that the sexual marketplace is inefficient (with an implied dig at the idea that employment is a right in the sense that you describe). Given roughly equal numbers of men and women who want sex and/or relationships, and treating men and women as fungible, there is an inefficiency if everybody isn’t satisfied, as partners can be rearranged to produce a greater number of satisfied people.
On the down side for this view, people aren’t in fact fungible. On the up side for this view, there are some obvious inefficiencies in the sexual marketplace, such as the distribution of genders across cities. On the “whatever” side for this view, I’m inclined to say that the root of the problem is that value on the sexual marketplace has greater variance for men than women, so the tails on both ends are dominated by men whose preferences cannot be satisfied, and the middle of the distribution has more women than there are men available to satisfy their preferences.
There are, of course, complications :-)
First, people are not fungible at all (outside of the fairly rare “any hole will do” approach and no, I don’t mean bisexuals).
Second, there is a lot of fuzziness about what’s actually being traded because under consideration is the whole spectrum from casual one-night stands to till death do us part. Notably when talking about the sex marketplace, what many people want is actually a relationship and that’s a bit different.
Third, there are difficulties because what you offer to exchange is not well-defined, partially hidden, and, to top it off, the participants have an incentive to lie about it.
Fourth, as you note, the market isn’t quite symmetric in that men and women have different needs, expectations, approaches, and techniques.
All in all, the market certainly isn’t perfect, but I don’t know if I would characterize the situation as a “market failure”. It’s just the usual human mess that most manage to muddle through.