The Students Turning to Sex Work to Pay for Uni

Students in the UK are increasingly turning to sex work to fund their life at university. A new report released last week revealed the perfect storm that has caused this situation: The student maintenance support system is “broken” and rental increases are soaring to 15 percent, leaving the average student £600 poorer each month. Some students are surviving on just “50p a week”.

As a result, around 56,000 have turned to sex work, among others who have resorted to gambling and credit cards, just to stay afloat. According to the Sex Workers’ Union (SWU), most students that go into sex work do so because of external financial pressures, while some choose it because their circumstances make traditional work difficult or because it’s easier to fit the flexible hours around their studies.

Universities across the country have been decidedly unhelpful to students who find themselves in this position. In 2018, the University of Brighton launched an investigation after a sex work outreach support group hosted a stall at the uni’s freshers’ fair. The Sex Workers Outreach Project Sussex said it was only providing advice to those who had already opted to do sex work to pay for uni fees and expenses, but a Brighton spokesperson said the institution will “not promote sex work to its students”.

Even when universities have tried to support students engaging in sex work, their attempts have failed. In 2021, an online toolkit – co-authored by academics and sex workers in conjunction with the University of Leicester to support students who do sex work – was subjected to a 10,000 strong Change.org petition calling for its removal. Despite the toolkit being largely focused on harm reduction, the push to get it rolled out across other universities stalled following the backlash.

With the current laws around sex work making it unsafe for anyone earning a living from it, it’s been left to fellow sex workers and organisations like the SWU and Decrim Now to pick up the slack. To understand more about the situation, VICE spoke with three students – all using fake names for privacy reasons – who have turned to sex work to survive university.

Ellie, 23, Leeds

VICE: When did you start uni and when did the financial pressure hit?
Ellie: I started in 2021, and I’m now in my second year. The financial strain emerged pretty much immediately. My accommodation was super expensive and ate up most of my money. If I wanted to buy food and enjoy my uni experience, I needed to work.

How much money do you have left over after maintenance loans?
Virtually nothing, not even enough to feed myself for the entire month. In my first year, it felt like I was constantly having to say no to things because I didn’t have enough money. I felt like I didn’t have the full uni experience. That’s when I got into credit card debt, because I wanted to go out and make friends – any savings I had before uni didn’t last long.

How did you actually get into sex work?
I’ve worked in retail since I was 16. I originally got a job in my first year as a retail assistant, but the pay was shit and I was on a zero hours contract. So if I got loads of shifts in a week it felt like I couldn’t refuse them, because I wasn’t guaranteed anything. It was starting to affect my uni work and my social life – I couldn’t balance anything. I looked into sex work because it seemed like I could earn more, and I could fit it around my uni work and sports clubs. OnlyFans seemed like it would take up a lot of time to be successful, so I got work at a brothel – it seemed safer to work alongside other people.

How’s that gone?
Doing sex work enabled me to pay off my credit card debt and cover my living expenses like food and socialising. My parents don’t have money to fund me through university, so it all has to come from me.

How does the work make you feel? Have you had any kind of support?
The work itself doesn’t make me feel any kind of way, it’s just work. What does make me feel isolated is that I feel like I’d risk my place at university if they found out what I did, so I can’t access any support through them. I can’t tell my friends and family either, because of the stigma surrounding sex work – I don’t know whether they’d understand. I’m also worried about the police. If they ever raided the brothel, I’d be terrified they’d report me to my university.

The only people I’ve ever had any support from have been other sex workers – my co-workers in the brothel have been my lifeline. They’ve given me so much advice on staying safe and one of them even did the same degree as me.

Eros, 21, Bristol

VICE: When did the financial strain emerge at uni?
Eros: I started uni in September 2021. For most of my first year I had savings, which covered a lot of what I needed. But when I moved into second year those had all gone. In the 2022-2023 uni year, all the money from my maintenance loan went into my rent. And it would’ve been the same if I was in uni this year. There was only a couple hundred quid for food, clothes, bus tickets and other essentials – nothing at all for enjoying myself. I managed to break even with a part-time job, as well as borrowing money from my family, but I still had no money left to enjoy myself.

How did you come up with sex work as a possible job?
I had set up a PornHub account when I was 19 before coming to uni and had a few small things on it, just for fun – to see if I could make any money. When I realised how much financial pressure I was under at uni, I started taking porn seriously. I started looking for people to film with and set up an OnlyFans account. From then I considered myself as actually working in the industry.

Is there anything you think people should know about the financial predicament many students are in?
Even with a student loan, a part-time job one night a week, and working as a porn star, I was still having to ration food, not go out, skip hobbies, cancel my gym membership, and ask family for money. The extra money sex work provided only meant I had enough to survive.

Jess, 22

VICE: How much money did you have left after maintenance loans?
Jess: Maintenance is £9,250 a year, so roughly £770 a month. First year rent and bills totalled to £700 a month as I was in a nice halls, so there was £70 left per month. During third year I lived in a cheap and horrific shared house, which was about £600 a month and there was £170 left over each month. Fourth year I had a lower maintenance loan as it was postgrad, so that didn’t even cover bills and rent. Final year I lived in a flat by myself so I could focus better, as I was on a difficult STEM course. The rent was £800 a month and bills were close to £100.

When did you first consider sex work as a possible job?
First year I needed a job ASAP, so I started bar work at a strip club in the first month. I became friends with the dancers and saw how much money they made, and moved to the other side of the bar around December of first year.

How did you find that?
It’s not easy money like some people think – it’s a really draining job. You need to stay physically fit, and you need to have a thick skin because the way men talk to you in these clubs is appalling. You also need to be able to survive off little sleep, be completely confident in yourself, and be able to dance in eight inch heels for eight hours. I’d leave work at 5AM and have lectures the next morning. I’d be physically and mentally exhausted, which definitely didn’t help my learning.

Is there anything else people should know?
The student finance system is not working – it’s not fair to students who work every night at uni. They’re expected to produce assignments of the same level as students who don’t need to work at all. Sex work was a godsend because I could make the money I needed in far fewer hours than a regular job. I knew students who worked five nights a week while doing their uni course.

At the start of our course we had a lecture about managing our time. Our lecturer created a timetable: eight hours sleep, one hour eating, six hours of lectures, one hour for hygiene and getting ready, one hour for socialising, one hour for exercise, one hour for travel and five hours for revision. Not once did he mention having time for a job.

@nichet