Migrant sex work
Because of their illegal and vulnerable economic status, some migrant sex workers may find themselves in situations where coercion and forced sex work may be present. Under international legal definitions of human trafficking, forced and coercive forms of sex work are considered to be instances of involuntary sex trafficking. However, many scholars caution against categorizing sex workers as either completely voluntary or completely involuntary. They often argue that sex work, like other forms of labor, can span a spectrum between the two extremes, with most circumstances falling in the middle through various labor rights violations. Nevertheless, the vulnerability of migrant sex workers can make them susceptible to exploitative or coercive labor practices that can resemble or be human trafficking.
Sex worker
While demographic characteristics of sex workers vary by region and are hard to measure, some studies have attempted to estimate the composition of the sex work communities in various places. For example, one study of sex work in Tijuana, Mexico found that the majority of sex workers there are young, female and heterosexual. Many of these studies attempt to use smaller samples of sex workers and pimps in order to extrapolate about larger populations of sex workers. One report on the underground sex trade in the United States used known data on the illegal drug and weapon trades and interviews with sex workers and pimps in order to draw conclusions about the number of sex workers in eight American cities. However, studies like this one can come under scrutiny for a perceived emphasis on the activities and perspectives of pimps rather than those of sex workers themselves. Another criticism is that sex trafficking may not be adequately assessed in its relation to sex work in these studies.