When 'Daddy Dates' Pay The Bills

Death, Sex & Money

• Episode: When 'Daddy Dates' Pay The Bills
• Website: Death, Sex & Money
• Feed URL: http://feeds.wnyc.org/deathsexmoney
• Duration: 00:25:21
• Published: 2018-04-18 18:00

When Lizzie* joined the website Seeking Arrangement as a college undergraduate, she thought it would be a short-term thing. The “sugar daddy” website mostly connects wealthy older men with attractive young women—“sugar babies”—who they pay for sex and dates. Two years after joining, Lizzie calls herself a professional sugar baby, although she keeps her work secret from everyone except a small circle of friends. She says she brings in $4,000 to $5,000 a month from various arrangements—far more than she makes from her job as a freelance copywriter.

Lizzie sees the relationships as purely transactional, but she says the men often don’t treat it that way. “They think they’re getting better girls if they’re not actually escorts,” she told me. I spoke with Lizzie about why she prefers seeing men who are new to Seeking Arrangement, and how she navigates her double life. 

*Name changed