Against the Price Cap on Sperm

Defying the state’s claim of partial ownership of our sperm

In Britain a man cannot be paid more than £35 for donating his sperm. This is an unjustifiable restriction on the principle of self-ownership; indeed, it amounts to the state claiming partial ownership of our sperm. Moreover, accepting the corruption or fairness arguments for the price cap on sperm would require, respectively, wage controls on the labour of medical professionals and limiting the freedom of beautiful women to choose their reproductive partners too. Regrettably, the price cap also results in a huge shortage of sperm for aspiring parents. For all these reasons the price cap on sperm must be abolished: The essence of man must be free.

Each individual fully owns himself, hence, he is entitled to charge whatever he wishes for his flesh and labour. If I wish to sell my hair, toenails or breastmilk or rent out my services in waitering, teaching or plastering, I am entitled to do so at any price I wish. It would be wrong for the state to limit the price at which I could sell my hair or teaching, hence, by the same reasoning, it is wrong for the state to impose a price cap of £35 on each trip to make a sperm donation. Indeed, this intervention ensures the state gains partial control over your sperm, meaning, in light of the state insisting this is rightful control, they are insisting they have a property right in your essence.

The accusation the state is claiming partial ownership of the sperm of men is not farfetched. If you owned a home with a covenant which ensured the former owners could set the price whenever you came to sell it, it would be admitted you do not have full ownership over the house, analogously, when the state is claiming an alike covenant on your sperm, they are implicitly insisting you do not have full ownership over your sperm either. They claim the remaining part of ownership. This socialism of our sperm is unjustifiable. You own yourself outright, and, your essence is wholly your own too.

What is the justification available for the price cap? I believe Michael Sandel provides the main arguments supporting this state intervention in to the sperm market. Sandel contends certain good or services being available on a free market will corrupt the norms through which these certain goods or services should be distributed. This raises the question of which norm sperm should be distributed by. When considering a free market in babies Sandel writes: ‘[P]utting a price tag on children would corrupt the norm on unconditional parental love; the evitable price differentials would reinforce the notion that the value of a child depends on his or her race, sex, intellectual promise, physical abilities and disabilities, and other traits.’

Since sperm partially constitutes babies, I am going to assume the norm of unconditional parental love applies here too. Let us for the moment accept babies or sperm should only be distributed according to this norm, I would contend the norm is already violated today, hence, maintaining this violation and a respecting self-ownership must be better. Admittedly sperm from fit, tall and intelligent men would probably sell for a higher price in a free market showing the children of the sperm donor without these characteristics their parents would have preferred these characteristics, i.e., their parental love would not be entirely unconditional. Children from sperm donors without these characteristics though can already discover their parents would have probably loved “them” more with these characteristics by simply looking at the number of applications for the desired sperm versus its availability, which is a rough proxy for a price.

Second, this norm is questionable at best as the basis for distribution. If love is ‘an intense feeling of deep affection’, parental love is rarely unconditional is the sense Sandel means, because, it changes along with the behaviour a child develops – and rightly so. Sure, a fixed quantity may almost always remain throughout time, but if Sandel believes sperm should only be allocated according to whether or not this fixed quantity exists within the parents, a sperm market without the price cap will fulfil this requirement as well. This is because parents typically love their children come what may. And if Sandel means the total quantity of love should be unconditional, and, since a free market in sperm undermines this norm, it should be price capped, it is an implausible argument.

Third, a respect for self-ownership requires sperm is distributed according to the free market. As Cecile Fabre has reasoned, as the heart surgeon may charge what he pleases for his services, even though the meaning, purpose, or, norm of those services is to ensure the continuation of life, analogously, the sperm donor should be allowed to charge what he pleases for his sperm too, even though the meaning, purpose or norm of that good is to help start a family. If sperm prices may be capped at expenses only, to ensure the norm of unconditional parental love solely pattens its distribution, are surgeon’s prices to be capped at expenses only, to ensure the norm of sustaining life solely pattens the services distribution too. No. This would be a gross violation of the surgeon’s self-ownership, hence, so is the price cap on sperm too.

Essentially, individuals should be free to do as they please with their own person and property. What of Sandel’s fairness argument though, i.e., the idea a free market in sperm will wrongly result in the poor only getting the poor-quality stuff. To begin with it must be said sperm already differs in price according to quality, meaning, the poor are “excluded” from the good stuff already. Allowing for differing prices for the sperm would only exacerbate this I suspect (although I am unsure here). If an egalitarian really wished to ensure equal access to the same quality sperm they would impose price controls on the services of sperm clinics, which, in all likelihood, would bankrupt many firms as the price would have to be equally low. And this would just deprive many aspiring parents of having any children at all.

I would question why justice should be concerned at all with ensuring equality of access to good sperm anyway. All else equal, women prefer tall men to short men and this characteristic is largely genetic. If women are entitled to equal access to good quality sperm, e.g., tall-tending sperm, via price controls, why should the state not ensure equal access to tall partners for women for normal procreation too. This could be achieved via the state prohibiting beautiful women from dating lots of tall men, taxing women dating lots of tall men, or, attaching a weighted dice to whether beautiful women can marry or procreate with tall men. All of these options are unjustifiable restrictions on self-ownership, or, what amounts to the same thing, individual freedom. Even should this egalitarianism be weighed against individual freedom in some way, minor interventions of these sorts are still unacceptable. Hence, the egalitarian justification behind them must be rejected, thus, there remains no proper justification for the price cap on sperm either.

Respecting self-ownership requires a free market in sperm donation, nevertheless, what would be the advantages of allowing for unrestricted payments to men? There are many. First, men would be able to maximise their income from their sperm if they so wished. Second, by removing the price cap and permitting sperm prices to be bid up, ‘the huge shortage of sperm’ which exists in the UK (according to the NHS themselves) would be reduced or eliminated, as new sellers would enter at the higher price. Many couples today are being deprived of the joys of raising a family because of a dislike among politicians for free markets for whatever reason. Third, I believe the quality of children would be higher. This is because sperm clinics would be allowed to pay sperm sellers higher prices according to their inheritable attributes, for example, their height, their attractiveness and their intelligence. You could imagine PhD students in mathematics being targeted by clinics and being paid hundreds of pounds for their samples. This is assuming intelligence is largely inheritable.

Before concluding it is worth noting a few of the other interventions in the sperm market which restrict freedom and diminish prospects for parents. First, is the requirement the identity of the donor must be revealed upon request when the child turns eighteen. Following the introduction of this legislation in 2005 the proportion of men with families donating fell, although, the overall trend of an increasing number of sperm donors did continue. Given some will view being identifiable as a cost, and, opting to being identifiable is always an option, I believe this policy has only reduced donations. This cost will only increase if recent proposals to make sperm donors immediately identifiable to children are passed. Second, sperm donors are limited to helping create ten families. If we permit men to have ten families via normal procreation though, why should men not be permitted to help create ten families via abnormal procreation too: Consistency demands a limit on both means or no limits at all. To ensure sexual freedom, the liberal must prefer the latter.   

Men are entitled to full ownership of their own sperm, hence, the price cap on their sperm, predicated on the notion the state has partial ownership in their sperm, is unjustifiable. The corruption and fairness arguments supporting this illiberal policy have been shown to be ineffective on their own grounds, or, to require unacceptable restrictions on individual freedom too. Moreover, the economist must condemn the intervention for creating ‘a huge shortage’ of sperm as well. In sum, the price cap on sperm must be abolished forthwith.