When one looks at the issue in purely economic terms, do purveyors of porn like Larry Flynt have a point in their quest for a bailout by the U.S. government?
In this article from Portugal’s business daily, the Jornal de Negocios, Frederico Bastião, a professor of ‘crisis economic theory’, makes a very strong case that adult entertainment deserves a bailout far more than even the auto industry.
Bastião writes in part:
“In fact, when one thinks about it, Mr. Hefner and company deserve much more than, for example, the automobile industry, which is due to receive tens of billions of dollars. Indeed, the adult entertainment business is more labor intensive and therefore more conducive to job creation. It is difficult to ship it offshore, since we aren’t talking about ‘call centers,’ but ‘call girls,’ for whom proximity is much more important; the automobile is almost completely delocalized, and what isn’t is only a matter of time.”
And the problems that the industry has are also the fault of the state. … Why buy a cow when I can get milk for free? With the product available on the Internet, why buy magazines or videos? Sales have fallen and the revenue from advertising along with it, because the state is incapable of protecting intellectual property (don’t laugh, this is intellectual property!) and preventing pirated copies from circulating everywhere. ”
By Frederico Bastião*
Translated By Brandi Miller
January 23, 2009
Portugal – Jornal de Negocios – Original Article (Portuguese)
I’m amongst those who deposited (a little-used term these days) great hope in President Obama, and who believe that there will be a major shift in policy in America and, one hopes, around the world. It’s about time, looking back at all the arbitrariness and mistakes of the previous administration. In recent times, one arbitrariness that has revolted me was that nothing was being done for an industry with deep roots in the U.S., and which exports in quantity and quality around the world: the adult entertainment industry (allow me to call it this, for lack of another translation, which would be worse).
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