Dancers’ Union Has Bare Essentials

Their new labor contract includes only one sick day and one holiday, but the dancers at the Lusty Lady strip club hope it has other benefits.

“I hope it shows … that we aren’t a bunch of giggling sorority girls or hopeless drug addicts,” said dancer Jezibel Scott, “but that we are intelligent women who are doing a very hard job and know how to fight for our rights.”

The first-ever contract for Scott and about 90 co-workers at the Lusty Lady - including janitors, bouncers and cashiers - provides pay increases bringing them to an average of $25 an hour.

“Dancers aren’t treated like princesses, they’re treated like kitchen help,” said Scott.

“There’s a very, very large percentage of the sex industry that is legal and certainly ready to be organized,” says Carol Leigh of the Sex Workers Caucus, a San Francisco-based lobbying group.