AJ Bailey is one of Vivid’s newest stars, signed in May of this year as a contract actress for the adult entertainment giant. Her first feature, The AJ Bailey Experiment, has been out since summer and features the first time she has performed sex scenes on screen with a male actor. Named by TMZ.com “the world’s smartest porn star,” Ms. Bailey holds a master’s degree from St. Andrew’s University in Scotland, where she studied anthropology and museum studies. In this interview with YNOT.com, we asked AJ about college, politics and the Great Recession’s effect on jobs both in and out of adult.YNOT: Let’s start with St. Andrews, since I have a relative who just started there as a freshman this Fall. Compare and contrast the academic experience in Scotland compared to your undergraduate work in Missouri. What kinds of things did you find were valued in Scotland that maybe aren’t valued quite so much here in the States?

AJ: Breeding. Haha. Kidding. My undergraduate experience was at a large ‘Big 12’ university in the Midwest, which is a far cry from St Andrews. It’s sort of apples to oranges but I’ll do my best. Both schools are heavy on tradition; St Andrews has about 500 years on Mizzou, however. I also can’t speak for the postgraduate environment at MU. There was a lot of drinking involved at both, and belonging to the right club (or in MU’s case sorority) was important. St Andrews was much more formal and worldly than my undergraduate experience. The student diversity was incredible. The experience was just so different, I could go on forever probably.

YNOT: If you could change one thing about American culture, make it more like European culture, what would it be?

AJ: The food, for starters. Fair trade, less preservatives, etc. I threw up nearly everything I ate the first week I came home. Seriously. I would certainly appreciate less “bible-thumping.” I think we are far more repressed than many Americans know. Europe seems far more lax about sex and other hot button issues.

YNOT: So you earned an MS in Anthropology and Museum Studies, and then returned to the States. Can you describe what it was like looking for work? Were there no decent jobs, or did you find you just enjoyed the adult entertainment business more than the other options?

AJ: Well to be honest, the economy was on its downturn as soon as I got back, and in my area of study, the majority of available jobs are in the non-profit sector. This presented me with a problem. Many of the jobs in my field were being cut to part-time or made non-paying internships. I was offered a very respectable job in my field at a conservation research facility, but I wasn’t willing to make the geographical sacrifice. I strongly feel that my education is not going to expire, and that the dry spell in the job market was presenting me with an opportunity to do something a little more fun and exciting.

YNOT: Thomas Jefferson believed in American exceptionalism, which he felt stemmed from an abundance of rural farmland combined with a relatively small population – things that were true in his day. These conditions, he believed, created an opportunity for independence that wasn’t available anywhere else. Do you believe that America is still the land of opportunity, or are most of the opportunities dried up and taken by big business interests?

AJ: I certainly don’t think we are any more exceptional than any other developed country. My family were immigrant farmers and are farmers to this day, and I think Jefferson’s philosophy was true for them even a generation or two ago. I am not a business or economics major and I’m not familiar with the prospects of foreign opportunities, but I think a better life and opportunities are not unique to the US. Overall, I don’t think that the sentiment is nearly as poignant as in Jefferson’s day.

YNOT: President Obama is tackling health care right now, and he has critics on both sides of the political spectrum in terms of how he’s handling the issue. Progressives are frustrated with his lack of public engagement on the issue, and soft stance on public insurance options, while conservatives are arguing that the government shouldn’t extend its hand in what has traditionally been a private industry in America. What’s your position on this issue, and do you think a public insurance option would be a positive development for independent performers in the adult entertainment business?

AJ: I think a public option in theory is great, but I think that insurance companies are so financially invested in our political system that I don’t know if we will ever see real change. I have been uninsured since I completed school, and it’s not fun. I think the whole debate is very frustrating. I feel that all of the people with their panties in a knot about a public option or even government-subsidized healthcare are the insured. I loved health care in the UK and think it is the smartest solution, personally. In terms of the adult industry, we do have our own little healthcare system called Adult Industry Medicine that has been instrumental in assisting the industry in sexual health. I don’t know how important health care is to a majority of the performers as they tend to be young, healthy, and without families of their own yet.

YNOT: This recession has its own language, so to speak, and one term we hear a lot these days is “too big to fail.” Financial institutions like Bank of America and Citibank were given billions of dollars from American taxpayers because of the belief that they were “too big to fail,” and that if they were allowed to fail it would have too big of an effect on working class Americans. Did you agree that these banks had to be saved? If they’re too big to fail, are they too big to exist? And looking forward, what do you think we need to do as a country to protect against a future recession?

AJ: This is definitely not my area of expertise. I think that a better watchdog on these banking systems would have been in order before things got so out of control. I certainly have real problems with the executive salaries and bonuses given after the bailout. From my jaded perspective we had to bail our banks out so that we wouldn’t be owned by the countries we are already borrowing from.

YNOT: How do you see the current recession affecting the people around you in the adult industry? Is it harder for girls to find work as models or performers, and where do you see this all ending up in another year or two?

AJ: Oh the recession has definitely hit porn. There is less shooting, and pay can be reduced. Three years ago a woman doing boy/girl scenes could pretty much get work almost every day of the week. Now only a handful of performers have that luxury. Don’t get me wrong, business is still good, but I can see a marked change. I hear from a website owner friend of mine that things are on their way back up again, but I don’t know. I worry for our economy now. Sex will always sell, but everyone is feeling the pinch.

More information about AJ Bailey’s newest film, The AJ Bailey Experiment, including its latest trailer, can be accessed at http://vivid.com/videos/the-aj-bailey-experiment.

To follow AJ Bailer on Twitter, visit http://twitter.com/bluegeisha.