Back in 2003, we did an IMHO thread about your “Indecent Proposal” price. I was the OP, and here I am again, perhaps proving I have an unhealthy fascination with the idea…
Anyway, in the eponymous movie, Robert Redford’s character pays a cash-strapped couple a million dollars to have one night of sex with Demi Moore’s character. Her husband, played by the redoubtable Woody Harrelson, encourages her before the act, but afterward finds himself consumed by jealousy.
So that’s the set-up for this survey, timely again because we have a bunch of different active posters than we did in 2003, and, hey, we’re in a recession, which may affect the supply and demand price of all sorts of commodities.
Because I feel that Robert Redford is an unfair factor, I substitute an ordinary-looking person of the gender you normally sleep with. Not hawt, not hideous… just an average Joe or Josephine.
How much money would it take for you to spend one night of relatively unbridled sexual congress with Joe (or Josephine)?
I’m a 27 year old single male. They would have to be very ugly for me to charge anything and even then I’d have trouble justifying much, maybe a grand top end.
On the other hand if I was married I’d want at least 3 mil and would probably push for 6 since that’s my number to retire and live life my way forever.
Currently checking with My Beloved to see what my going rate is, but I wouldn’t mind if, after you handed the envelope off to her, you slipped me a fin on the side.
The OP needs more details:
Am I doing this with the full consent of my spouse? Because then this becomes a joint decision really - ‘how much would you and your spouse accept to have you sleep with someone?’
Or is it for a married person ‘how much would you accept to sleep with someone, without telling your wife, and hoping you won’t get caught?’
Or is this directed at a single person, asking ‘how much would I have to pay you to have sex with someone who is not stunning, but not hideous?’
Also, do I get to keep the money regardless of how satisfied my partner is? Because I could take the money, make a five-minute effort, say “sorry, my dear, failing to perform happens to everyone at least once” and then escape discretely through the bathroom window.
The movie involves the offer being made jointly, as it were, to both husband and wife. But if you’re single, you may respond as well, stipulating that you’re single. (Obviously, it’s less complicated for the single folks, but not without at least some moral quandry, I would imagine).
But if it helps, you may imagine that this offer is being made to you. If you’re married, you may choose to involve your spouse, or you may decide that for a sufficiently big payoff, which you will use to both you and your spouse’s benefit, he/she is better off not knowing details.
Or whatever other flimsy rationales you may conceive of.
As to how good your effort is… the well-heeled billionaire is acting in good faith, and expects the same of you. Sure, of course you may legitimately be unable to rise to the occasion, but you have to try, for real.
Oh, and to answer my own question: decline. Don’t get me wrong – a few extra million kicked into the retirement fund would be much appreciated, but there’s no amount of money that would make me risk damaging my marriage…
When the movie came out, my wife was in graduate school and I was working my way up the ladder. During a cocktail party we discussed this.
She said that she would never do it. However, she said that I was welcome to go for it for $250k or more for one night, assuming all disease checks were made in advance and that the money went into our joint account. Only other stipulation is privacy - this is not to be done in a way that is known publicly. In the vernacular - she is willing to pimp me out, but not whore out herself. I would put our price higher today - and a million would certainly suffice.
Similarly to Bricker, I wouldn’t want to damage my marriage. I would discuss it with my wife first and get her agreement. Looking at it objectively, is one night of sex really that bad? Compare it to something else - cooking a fine meal for that other person and doing the dishes afterwards, or telling that other person your deep dark secrets and baring your soul to them? Would you do that for a large sum?
I could see myself doing it for, I don’t know, $2,198,347.53 dollars or some such amount. On the other hand, when I ask myself how much someone would be willing to pay me to have sex with them, I estimate the best I would get would be around $2.56. So there goes that idea.
Money just isn’t that great a motivator for me given my husband and my current economic situation (we’re comfortable).
I suppose if we were destitute and I needed to pay for surgery for him (in an alternative universe where Canada doesn’t have universal healthcare) my opinion might change, but right now - I’ll pass.
Yes, obviously most of us would not be realistically able to command the kind of money that makes these things fun to talk about. (On the other hand, I’m reminded of a Dilbert cartoon in which the evil Dogbert has come into a huge sum of money and says to some random passer-by, “I’ll give you ten thousand dollars to wallow around in that mud over there.” The next frame shows the person writhing about in the filthy mud, and Dogbert musing to himself, “I don’t see how rich people can ever get bored.”)
But my wife would, I’m fairly certain, be accepting of my decision to cook a fine meal for someone else and doing the dishes afterward. Not so much, the sex. And for my point of view, I’d have no problem with my wife cooking a fine meal for that other person and doing the dishes afterwards, either, but I would have a hard time getting past the idea that she banged him, no matter how fat our checking account got the next day.
