[benologist]

Countries with reasonable prostitution laws are safer for the people working within that legal framework, not the ones coerced into working outside it - I live in Costa Rica where it is also legal but there are still enslaved adults and children coerced into selling sex, Amsterdam has illegal prostitution coexisting alongside women in windows too. That's examples of illicit sex industries alongside legal ones on three different continents.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_the_Netherland...

But let's say you are right. Prostitution globally is completely legalized and somehow there is no illicit demand for boys and girls, cheaper rates etc. How does that stop the cartels from making money in hundreds of other ways? It is just one line of business, they have plenty more and can always invent new ones.