The answer to everything?

The jury has to decide an outcome they are comfortable with. If not they are fired and replaced with a fresh trial.

Politicians craft legislations that they can pass, and make them look good.

Law enforcement, like everybody else, are paid to do something. They like to have enough resources to get things done, or don't bother.

Game Theory was developed to formally analysis situations with winners and losers, and to predict the outcome and equilibrium. GT has been applied successfully to economics where the markets aren't ideal; how about illegal negotiations?

Is it illegal to pick up a $100 bill on the streets? Who cares. It's unlikely someone will find out or you will get prosecuted.

You lock your doors, right? If you don't and you are broken into, your neighbors will think that you are stupid. And if you have valuable jewels or paintings in your home, the insurance company will be very suspicious.

1. Most people do (lock their doors)
2. You protect your valuables
3. What will the others think?

I have a religious friend who was overwhelmed by the new Christian country that he temporarily resides. Most of his friends in similar situations were very happy. It was so easy. They held wild parties often, where everybody got drunk. At the end the guys would decide who should take which remaining drunken body back to their dorm room. My friend recalled the conversations in one such instant. May be it was actually him who asked with disapproval, "what if those are your sisters?". The other guys just laughed, "want to take one?". The righteous guy left.

OK, so no means no. An unconscious person cannot say yes. But the law is one thing, jurors are just ordinary non progressive human beings. And there are the mitigating circumstances. Nobody want to ruin a guy's life because he made a mistake probably drunk. Even a mother juror will think that she raised her daughter well enough for her never to do such vulnerable things. It's more easy for her to convict the victim's parents. Alright, it's my conjecture, but do you know what a juror will think? Certainly, criminals and victims alike, don't put your fate on the jury's hands if you don't have to. [I mean prevention.]

So it is just a game, or at least the theory. The temptation is there. It's not protected. Most likely he's also drunk or half drunk. If he's not, and he thinks he can get away with it, GT dictates that he will do it.

The zero th law of Game Theory is not to enter a game that you don't even know how to play. (I made it up.) Emma Thompson is quite right to urge you to visit your local brothels to see for yourself. But if she actually does, will she be off the mark? This is more like the reality of trafficking(search for Sheffield trafficking). It's rather hard to hide a brothel in, say, a Surrey town, or LA (parts of) for that matter.

She is quite right that looking for suspicious activities at your neighborhood helps. But that brings out the problem of having something legal. In London, you have nothing to complain about if you neighbor has 40 clients a day - it could well be all legal activities. What is the chance of discovering illegal activities in a Sheffield housing project? Who bothers?

In comparison, when too many people pressed the wrong door bells in LA, something must be illegal enough to be reported. It's a simple matter for the police to talk to the johns coming out, threaten them with legal actions unless they confess what they have done. Then the police have enough to deploy decoys and get convictions.

It is urban legend that all prostitutes and johns know where all the other prostitutes are. They don't, but some play into the popular believe unconsciously. The market is not only highly segmented, but compartmentalized into many secretive zones.

According to the CIA, most trafficking victims in the US are from Latin America and South East Asia, with some recently from Central and Eastern Europe. The fact that it's pretty difficult for the general public, john included, to encounter trafficking victims because:
1. people stay away from no go areas, johns or not
2. no advertisement
3. simply a bad deal

From old news, the Latin American "agencies" are well hidden. There are underages but the whole thing are for those with nothing to lose. No normal people will risk going into unfamiliar areas in LA, which can be fatal by itself. If you become a sex offender you will carry the label for life, telling people where you live always and usually lose everything in the process. I bet nobody can find me a South East Asian of interest. There are very few, if any, in the open market. I can't. There were some obviously "Russian agencies" advertising on the major online malls a while back. They stood out from the crowd anyway, advertise or not. And nobody will go there if they don't operate in decent neighborhoods such as West Hollywood, not East, not North. I guess they never took off and disappeared.

I have been disappointed by journalists reporting on trafficking. Last time it was supposed to be an interview with a trafficked victim working in a San Francisco brothel, who got busted. There was this Korean woman who got lured into sex jobs and became a trafficked victim. OK, then the story skipped to the day after she worked enough and got freed from the traffickers. The story began when she decided to work at her free will at a San Francisco massage parlor. She earned enough to repay all her debts and left, getting a $1000 goodwill gift so she would recommend other any girls who need money to come and work there.

Actually the journalist was telling another story without knowing it. SF is a peculiar place where they want to ban the US navy from using the ports, and brothels are virtually legal at some point. The best ones are right on the main roads, decorated like luxury clubs, well, a little. They have rooms as good as decent motels. Any Korean girl who has huge credit card debts knows where to turn to get quick money, be it in Soul, LA, or San Jose. The money for them is good, and it's safe inside. The selection is rather good, indeed there's nothing quite like it in the CJK world, where you pay a lot for privileges of something like an exclusive golf club, while in SF you pay mostly for the girl and sex. There are spinners in sexy skirts, cute student lookalike in jeans, presentable OLs in smart causals, and bikini model lookalikes in bikinis. They don't pay for expensive fixtures, no management teams to handle the girls and clients. You go in and take your pick.

Back to Game Theory. These "agencies" don't easily let the general public in. It's simply too risky. You only need one wrong john who feel guilty enough to report to the police.

It's urban legend that you can do whatever you want to the trafficking victims. I'm sure they suffers but not from average joes. They are treated as objects and goods. Any smart "owners" will protect their investment with care. They lose a lot if their goods are damaged and are taken out of service even for a day or two. No violent sex, no unsafe sex.