The Value of Smart Eggs

A few weeks ago, Aaron D.
Levine (Assistant Professor, Georgia Institute of Technology) visited my Taboo Trades
and Forbidden Markets seminar in advance of the release of his Hastings
Center Report: Self-Regulation,
Compensation, and the Ethical Recruitment of Oocyte Donors.  The report represents an important
effort at bringing empirical analysis to bear on questions that are often
answered largely through anecdote: who are egg donors, how much are they paid
and why, and how are they found? (Paul
Caron has links to the extensive media coverage).

The report uses a novel data set—a collection of oocyte
donor recruitment ads published in college newspapers across the country—to
assess the extent to which advertisements that recruit donors comply with the
ASRM guidelines for compensating oocyte donors, which specify maximum
compensation levels of $5000, in the absence of justification, and prohibit
compensation above $10,000.  Levine
finds that $5,000, the maximum compensation level acceptable under the ASRM
guidelines without justification, was both the modal and median value among the
set of 105 advertisements.

Roughly 50% of the advertisements offered compensation in
excess of $5000 and roughly 23% offered compensation in excess of $10,000.  Some of the ads offering more than
$5000 and most of those offering above $10,000 also contained appearance or
ethnicity requirements, which is prohibited by the ASRM compensation
guidelines.   Finally — and
this is the portion of the report that has generated the most media attention
— Levine’s data strongly suggest that donor agencies and couples are placing more
value on oocytes donated by women with higher SAT scores, which would violate
the ASRM guidelines.   Indeed,
in one model, an increase of one hundred points in the SAT score of a typical
incoming student increased the compensation offered to oocyte donors by $1,930
for general advertisements placed by donor agencies; by $3,130 for
advertisements placed on behalf of a specific couple; and by $5,780 for
advertisements placed by a donor agency on behalf of a specific couple.

It’s a testament to Aaron’s good nature that he’s still
friendly to me, after I first invited him to Duke for a workshop, then attacked
his paper for an hour and a half.  (I
did buy several rounds of drinks at the Washington Duke as reimbursement, as
I’m a strong believer in just compensation).  Though Levine’s research brings much-needed empirical
insight to bear on questions of egg donor compensation, I very much disagree
with the report’s normative position – that the ASRM oocyte donor compensation
restrictions are justifiable and their violation a cause for industry, public,
and government concern.  

The report’s conclusion relies on three highly contestable
assumptions: (1) that oocyte donor compensation is commodifying; (2) that
oocyte donor compensation, especially at high levels, is coercive or
exploitative; and (3) that selecting and compensating oocyte donors on the
basis of personal characteristics, such as ethnicity or intelligence, is
ethically problematic.  The first
two assumptions – commodification and coercion – are ones that I’ve critiqued
at length, both in recent scholarship (see here and here) and
on this blog (see the links below). 

But the third assumption – that selecting and compensating
oocyte donors on the basis of personal characteristics presents ethical
problems – is dubious as well.  The
fertile have always selected reproductive mates based on qualities such as
appearance, race, ethnicity, and intelligence.  Their sorting process is normally more subtle than a four or five
figure advertisement in a prestigious college newspaper, but the infertile have
fewer options at their disposal and the end result is the same – some traits
are more highly valued in a reproductive mate than others, a realization that should
have no shock value among even the most sheltered of academic sensibilities.

In his
response accompanying the report, John Robertson
(Texas, law) questions whether there are really any ethical problems raised by
the study – after all, Levine finds compliance with the ASRM guidelines in at
least half the advertisements in his sample.  I would argue, however, that Levine’s study highlights a
serious ethical issue, though it is not infertile couples or the agencies
working on their behalf whose behavior is ethically troubling.  It is ASRM’s paternalistic and
misguided attempts to control oocyte donor compensation through the same type
of professional guidelines that courts have rejected when employed by
engineers, lawyers, dentists, and doctors that should raise an ethical red
flag.

Related Posts:
U.K.
Oocyte Raffle
How Is An Egg Donor Like A Prostitute?

Like A Virgin? We Sell That Here!


Sunny Samaritans or Entrepreneurs? New York
Allows Egg Donor Payments For Stem Cell Research


A New Meaning To "Nest Egg"


U.K. To Reconsider Payments to Egg and Sperm
Donors