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Elsewhere, of course, similar mismatches between supply and demand are mediated quite effectively through the market. If people clamor to purchase frilly pink tulips and the tulip harvest is meager, then the price of tulips will rise until it equilibrates demand. This equilibration proved tricky in the egg market, though, because people couldn’t quite determine whether eggs were something that could, or should, be sold. Virtually every country, for example, prohibits the sale of kidneys and other human organs, which explains why they are constantly in short supply. [34] Some countries also prohibit the sale of blood. Yet others, including the United States, permit the commercial “donation” of both blood and sperm, on the grounds that they are renewable body parts rather than organs.

So which regime made sense for eggs? Initially, it appeared that eggs might be classified more as organs; the United Kingdom, for example, pursued this policy route, along with several other European nations. But no restrictions were forthcoming in the United States, and so both price and commerce eventually crept into the equation, softly and subtly at first, and then with explicit vigor. Around 1990, a handful of fertility clinics began quietly advertising for potential egg donors. They posted notices for “healthy women willing to help infertile couples” and offered to pay a fee of about $2,500 to cover “time and inconvenience.” Almost as soon as the ads were posted, “donations” appeared: from graduate students, young mothers, struggling actresses. Most of the women expressed a fervent desire to help other women in need; some had watched relatives struggle with infertility or felt particularly grateful for a stroke of compassion in their own lives. Nearly all, though, were clearly also responding to the financial incentives inherent in a lump sum payment for several weeks of “work.”

At this point, a small group of outsiders began to realize that eggs, like sperm, had the makings of a market. One example was Shelley Smith, a former actress working as a family counselor in Beverly Hills. After conceiving her own children through egg donation, she decided in 1990 to go out on her own, serving as a broker between potential egg donors and would-be recipients. In 1991, Smith started placing ads in publications geared to young actresses, offering an “extremely rewarding financial and emotional opportunity” to young women with the right kind of eggs. Rather than operate as a fertility specialist—something she wasn’t— Smith became an intimate intermediary. She handpicked her “angels,” screening for attractiveness, intelligence, good health, and “heart.” She gave them psychological tests and a battery of interviews, plus tokens of appreciation—chocolates, a massage, sometimes a diamond necklace— after their egg retrieval. Then she offered her donors, regular and premium, to an upscale clientele, couples who were picky about their eggs and willing to pay $4,500 to Smith’s Center for Egg Donation in addition to the donors’ fee and normal IVF charges. When Smith opened her doors in 1991, she was the only independent egg broker in Los Angeles. But competition quickly emerged, from large-scale players like Bill Handel’s Center for Surrogate Parenting and the Virginia-based Genetics & IVF Institute, as well as a slew of small-time brokers.