'Your City Could Be Better': Could a Nevada Brothel Help Redefine Labor Standards Nationwide? — Presented By City Cast Denver

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This is your city could be better because it could be.

I'm David Flotz.

If you love your city and still complain about it, you're in the right place.

There's a fascinating labor fight brewing outside Las Vegas that could have huge implications

for gig workers everywhere.

Sex workers, or to use the Nevada term Cortezans at one of the legal brothels located near

Vegas are trying to unionize.

The workers at Sherries Ranch and Perump Nevada have long been treated as independent contractors,

but they're now fighting to be recognized as employees instead because of the benefits

that come with that.

If this argument sounds familiar, it's probably because you've heard Uber drivers, food delivery

drivers, and other gig economy workers try and generally fail to make the same argument

in courts across the country.

So our brothel workers in Nevada are going to set a precedent that changes how we interact

with workers in every American city.

I'm joined by former CityCast Las Vegas host current contributor and long time Nevada

attorney David Figgler to break it down.

David, welcome to your city could be better.

I am so happy to be here.

Let's talk about sex, David Flotz.

Let's talk about you and me.

So let's begin with the obvious point, which is that for people outside of your state,

this is just weird legal brothels.

So where are they?

How many are there?

How are they legal?

Yeah.

Look, brothels were a part of, I think, the American West culture during the 1800s in many

different states.

Eventually, that all kind of went by the wayside, including in Nevada.

But around, I'm going to say 1971 or so, the first county in Nevada legalized prostitution,

it was presented as an experiment.

There were plenty of social ills associated with illegal prostitution, and this was an

effort to not just curb it, but legitimize it in the way that people were paying taxes

and it was regulated, et cetera.

So that's been going on for quite a while, eventually the state of Nevada caught up,

and they passed a law that allowed any county under a certain degree of population.

So it immediately excluded the county where Las Vegas is and the county where Reno is.

But all the other counties had the right, if they wanted to, to allow brothels.

And I'd say of the remaining counties in Nevada, a little bit over half of them allow

prostitution.

Nye County, which is the one that is about 45 minutes from Las Vegas, is one of the

more notorious ones and they have quite a few brothels.

So what are working conditions like in Nevada, brovel?

If you work there, what is your job, what is your job like?

Sure.

And then after you talk about that, what are some of the unusual working conditions you would

not find in other workplaces?

Well, obviously it's a very intimate job.

I mean, it is one that I think people can sort of visualize what it's all about.

The difference is that it's very regulated.

So the workplace as it is is kind of insular.

As I understand it, you go on plots of time where you are in the brothel, like you cannot

leave.

That has to do with disease control and exposure, et cetera, because there is a very stringent

testing regimen, there is also other regulations that the state imposes in making sure that

the brothels are safe workplaces, okay?

So that is the sort of basic.

When you get into the weeds of how the operations themselves work, it's a little proprietary.

It's all very contractual, but essentially a brothel worker will sign a contract, say

that they're going to be there for the two-week stretch or whatever it is.

They live on-premises, they sleep there, they cook there, they interact with each other

there.

From my understanding, it's a fairly social environment with the fellow workers.

And then clientele come in.

They either have made reservations ahead of time or, you know, very spontaneous selection.

And then they go back and negotiate a fee, various sex acts occur, only those which the brothel

worker is comfortable doing by all accounts.

And then there's an exchange of cash for sex and move on to the next customer.

Do you know what the fees are, by any chance?

They really do range.

They're not allowed to advertise or discuss the fees outside of literally the bedroom spaces.

So what'll happen is a customer will go in, find someone who they find that they would

like to have, engage, and then they go back to the room and they negotiate it.

Now the house is listening to the negotiations just to make sure that there's nothing shady

that occurs or nothing that would be off books because the money goes to the house and

then back to the worker.

And it could be anything from a couple of hundred dollars I'd imagine, up to thousands of

dollars depending on how long you want to be there, how many courtesans you would like

in the particular encounter, and probably a million other variations and iterations that

exist within that universe.

So that's one interesting thing you just mentioned there, which is you're constantly being

surveilled, at least in the transaction, if not presumably not in the sexual activity

itself, presumably not, yeah, correct.

Okay.

So what changed at Sherry's Ranch in late 2025 according to the workers?

What do they say management was demanding that they sign in order to keep working there?

Yeah.

And we had some workers on citycast Las Vegas to talk about it.

It's a fantastic episode.

Sherry's Ranch is probably one of the bigger brothels in the state.

It is the one that is, I believe, closest to Las Vegas.

It's very fancy.

A lot of brothels, especially out in the rural areas of Nevada are essentially trailers

that are interconnected, whereas Sherry's Ranch is a casino level hotel level space with

a golf course and some other amenities.

So I have been there, David.

I'm going to admit it to you.

They did have an open house some years ago where they did a barbecue for the community.

They're very engaged.

One of the owners of Sherry's Ranch is a former homicide detective in Las Vegas.

And a lot of the brothel workers and other workers, they serve food.

They have alcohol license.

Live in Las Vegas and they do the commute.

So Sherry's Ranch, maybe above and beyond most of the other ones in Las Vegas, certainly

Las Vegas areas, Southern Nevada area, is a fancy spot.

And tend to draw the more, I don't know, high profile or accomplished courtesans.

What had changed in answer to your question was the new contract, because it behooves

the brothel to maintain the sort of independent contractor who signs a contract, which theoretically

has equal bargaining power that we'll get to that probably in a second.

They had put in some new provisions and some of the workers there felt that it had crossed

the line.

And mainly, dealing with their intellectual property rights, their name, image, likeness,

and then there were also some concerns about how AI might be used to take some of those

images and in perpetuity, utilize that person's face in a highly sexualized manner.

And with the intellectual property, so what do the courtesans say that Sherry's Ranch

was asking for?

And I think I want you to bring in only fans here, because there's an only fan.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, I mean, really, ever since the pandemic, a lot of the sex workers, especially those

who decide to go and work at the brothels, have been side hustling.

You know, there just wasn't a lot of customers, I think, during quarantine.

It'd be very difficult to do some of the services offered while masked.

And I don't know that they were doing COVID testing during the height.

So, you know, I think a lot of them turned to only fans and found it to be a very lucrative

side hustle.

I think that there is a percentage of those workers who are also engaged in other adult

oriented or just general creative arts.

The guests that we had on CityCast Las Vegas talked about that she's also in a band and

creates music with that band.

But you know, most of them are concerned about their only fans' content stuff that's being

posted on maybe some of the pornographic websites or the chat websites, et cetera.

And how anything created while they were at the brothel during that time frame, because

it's not constant business, business, business.

I mean, there are gaps of time where they are making or augmenting their income.

We're going to be fully the property through this contract of the brothel.

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Let's go to this question about, which I think is at the heart of this and why we're doing

this episode.

I suppose because it's salacious, but it's at the heart, but it's going to this question

about gig workers or independent contractors.

So management of Sherries Ranch says they're independent contractors.

The portazans say that they are employees.

What is this distinction?

Why is it important?

And how does it get decided?

That is really in every state, you know, this idea of who's an employee and who's an

in-bank contractor has implications well beyond whether you can unionize or not.

But that is a prerequisite.

Like if you are an independent contractor, you're not eligible for unionization.

If you are an employee, obviously you are.

And so, you know, this fight in Nevada is not limited to the brothel workers.

You know, there's some precedent here within the state of dancers at gentleman's clubs,

exotic dancers, strippers that have been asking for status as employees so they could claim

over time they could get workers compensation.

They can, you know, log in at least a minimum wage in addition to that above and beyond

for their services.

And you know, the Nevada Supreme Court has consistently said, yeah, because of the nature

of how the strip clubs control, how the dancers operate, what all the rules are, how they function

that they are indeed employees.

And then the Nevada state legislature very dutifully changes the rules and expands what

an independent contractor is.

So it kind of like vitiates what the Supreme Court has determined under the law.

And I think this fight is happening in many states because there's so many fields.

Construction is probably the biggest one, David, where the distinction between who is an

independent contractor and who is an employee is at the heart of not just union battles,

but these other, you know, state compensation battles.

And then when it comes to the idea of, you know, what is work product when you're an employee,

sometimes what you create is owned by your employer, whereas an independent contractor,

you tend to be able to negotiate those rights.

And that's something we saw with the screen actor's guild as a union trying to negotiate

for their members.

And so outside of there being contracts, ultimately a state has to determine whether or not somebody

is an independent contractor who's not subject to some of these regulations or an employee

who it is.

With a battle like this, it goes to the National Labor Relations Board.

And the brothel workers have affiliated with the communication workers of America, which

is a prominent AFL-CIO union.

They have filed a complaint at the NLRB, the National Labor Relations Board, saying that

they need to be designated as employees and that they have a right to unionize if they

choose to do so.

But also that they're deserving of the protections because some of the brothel workers who were

behind this labor effort were basically told that they cannot continue to work at the

brothels.

So I know you're not a labor lawyer and you're not representing anyone in this.

I was a labor lawyer back in the 90s, David.

Okay.

And the 90s the law was totally different.

Yeah, totally different.

When you look at this, so what are the main arguments that say somebody like a brothel

worker, a court of zan, is an employee and what are the main arguments that say no,

she is an independent contractor.

The argument for them being employees is that they really are subject to many, if not

completely, the whim of the brothel owners and how they operate within that environment.

There have been some brothel workers who have penned op-eds in our local papers saying

they don't want to be declared employees and that they feel that they are correctly classified

as independent contractors because they have the autonomy like refusing a customer if

it's someone who they don't want to engage with or that they can choose to leave early

if they want or pick the times that they operate.

And then there's other nuances on how they're advertised, how they're presented.

Most of the brothels do have websites, certainly Sherry's Ranch does.

It's very intricate the way that the courtesans are presented there and how they're communicated

with.

So basically the brothel does maintain a lot of control and also kind of calls the shots

on how the money is split once they go into the brothel situation, but that's all contract

negotiations with potentially independent contractors or employees, whatever the destination

comes down to, but they don't have a lot of power.

And I think that's why a lot of them who have been clamoring for union think that it is

a better way to negotiate collectively for some of the things that they don't get right

now as brothel workers.

So it sounds like the NLRB, the National Labor Relations Board will decide whether they

are employees and also whether they have a then have a right to organize.

Correct.

And then the implication is this is a very unique set of circumstances, but because it's

so intense and because these other issues like name image likeness, like AI come into the

conversation, how they are classified for, you know, in a lot of ways acting.

Let's be real or, you know, I don't want to be crass, but it is a kind of akin to a

lot of other gig economy where you just sort of, you know, dip into the business when

you want to is going to have implications because if these mostly women, as I stated,

are granted employee status and have the ability to unionize, then I think a lot of other

workers who are kind of on that bubble and we're talking about, you know, rideshare drivers

and maybe even actors and others, you know, those construction workers who are out there

could have an argument that if the brothel workers are getting it, how come we're not

getting it, you know, that sort of thing.

I think how the NLRB classifies and what formulas they apply really could have implications

in this fight that is literally in every state, you know, now you're getting into like

influencers and and TikTok stars and whatnot and how they negotiate their contracts and

stuff, can they have representation as a creative in this realm?

And I think that this brothel fight is going to have implications for that aspect of

it as well.

So Nevada is one of the most heavily unionized states, Vegas is one of the most heavily

unionized cities in the U.S. So first of all, why is that?

And does do you think that fact makes it in any way more likely that the courtesans will

prevail?

It sounds like you think not because in the case of dancers, they prevailed, but then

the state legislature changed the rules.

Nevada's a mixed bag, David.

Yes, you are correct.

The Las Vegas strip itself has one of the strongest unions in the country.

The culinary union here is one of the shining lights of the AFL CIO and they have unionized

every single property on the Las Vegas strip.

We're talking hospitality workers, housekeeping, food, beverage, etc.

They are very strong, very mighty and very powerful as an influence, but Nevada itself

is also a right to work state.

And while we do have some strong union presence, buildings and trade, teamsters, etc., not

all occupations are unionized.

And certainly we also have a very vibrant gig economy, as you can imagine, in Las Vegas,

where there's no chance of unionizing.

Just a side note, my dad was a card dealer at the Sahara Hotel for years and he always

wanted to be in a union, but the card dealers for whatever reason can't get over the hump

of figuring out how to unionize.

It's really kind of interesting.

So Vegas, like everything else, it's a mixed bag.

So yeah, I think that under the current administration, it's highly unlikely that the NLRB is going

to deem the individuals as employees.

However, I never say never, if they follow the same rules that the state of Nevada followed

in the Supreme Court in analyzing the situation and they do take into account those federal

rules, it's anyone's guess.

What do you think your city can be better listeners can take away from this conversation

to make their own city better?

This fight is really a fundamental fight about who deserves protections, whether it's unionized

or not, about who deserves minimum wage, who deserves workers cop, who deserves overtime

benefits, who deserves a lot of the protections in the workplace, and then above and beyond

that, how are we dealing with these new issues of name, image, likeness, exploitation,

and how AI operates in these realms?

I mean, look, our example here is a very unique and intimate one, but I think that no matter

how this goes from the NLRB, a lot of states are kind of looking at how this classification

is going to shake out, because I think other cities may be concerned about the exploitation

of labor, whether it be gig or intimate workers or sex workers or people who are in the creative

fields, are definitely going to have these same arguments, maybe not as intense, and again,

not as intimate, but as important.

And I think that any state or city looking at what's happening just outside Las Vegas

would be well served to kind of follow the pathway of what these workers are who are

standing up for themselves.

Let's turn to the word on the street, or maybe in your case, the word on the strip.

I want to park and back to some conversations that you and I have had over the years.

So one of the things you've talked to me about in your time at CityCast was how Vegas

has neighborhoods that are very diverse in the kinds of jobs that people have compared

to other cities.

In most cities, like in my city of D.C., neighborhoods tend to cluster people in similar

kinds of professions.

They're similar.

They earn at similar levels, and to earn at a similar level, you kind of have to work

in a particular cluster of jobs.

So my neighborhood, for example, has lots of lawyers and knowledge worker types.

But because Vegas is heavily unionized, has lots of well-paying trade professions, and

it just has a kind of different economy than other places, neighborhoods are different.

So talk about that, talk about how that changes the community, what's good about it, is there

anything bad about it, other cities aspire to it?

Well, to the degree that we can be egalitarian in where people live and thrive, sure, I think

it's a great model.

People are shocked, shocked, David, to learn that over two and a half million people live

in the Greater Las Vegas Valley.

Now while that pales in comparison to the 40 plus million people who come and visit us

and tend to stick to just that one street, the strip, there are lots and lots of folks

who live here and find their spaces and find their neighborhoods.

And we are, in a lot of ways, a melting pot of the United States melting pot, right?

We have more people who aren't from here than who are generationally from here.

And so I think in that respect, a lot of neighborhoods form just like you would see it in other

neighborhoods.

But there is a sense of the transitory nature and the fact that, like you said, there

are really interesting well-paying jobs that allow people to live in areas that perhaps

would be precluded in other communities.

I could speak to my neighborhood specifically, and my neighborhood is in the oldest part

of downtown where the oldest continually residential area going all the way back to the 1930s,

David.

Can you imagine how far back that was for a city?

Yeah, I know.

We're a baby.

But I have a coffee clatch that meets almost every morning at the local coffee shop.

And within my coffee clatch are all neighbors, and I will just rattle off some of the jobs

of my neighbors.

In that group, we have a bartender at a casino.

We have a guy who works in gaming technology.

We have a general contractor.

We have a professional photographer.

There's a professional masseuse.

There's a lawyer slash podcaster.

That's me.

There's a guy who sells rare records for a living.

It's a really mixed group.

And within that, there's some ethnic diversity, et cetera.

Las Vegas, like any other place, you know, you're going to find Spanish-speaking area

where a lot of, there's a lot of lack of ethnic diversity.

But generally speaking, I mean, as a lot of people say about Las Vegas, the only color

that really matters in a city like Las Vegas is green.

So if you have the money to live in the neighborhood where the prices are appropriate, you're more

than welcome.

And I think that kind of diversity, if you will, definitely serves us for becoming a more

interesting and fuller city, despite the fact that people don't recognize this as such.

But we know.

We know here.

Yeah.

I mean, I wish I had somebody who is a bartender as my neighbor or somebody who is a general

contractor as my neighbor.

It's boring just to be like, oh, yeah, I also sit in front of a computer all day.

Yeah.

Well, they're great at calling out when we get stuff wrong on the podcast or, you know,

giving us ideas of things that we should be talking about.

I mean, you want to talk about, this is what your city is talking about.

Come to my coffee clatch, add Vesta coffee every morning, and you'll hear what Las Vegas

is talking about from all quarters.

It's kind of fun.

And I think that's a great part of any neighborhood.

David Figgler, thanks for coming on your city.

Could be better.

You can listen to David occasionally on citycast Las Vegas, which has a new episode out

every weekday morning.

That's all for today's episode of your city.

Could be better.

I'm your host, David Plotz, and our producers were Lizzie Goldsmith.

We're on Cateilvay, David Figgler, Sonia Joe Swanson, and Layla Muhammad, our music

is by Carl Christensen.

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