When Jane began working in strip clubs four years ago, she earned between $600 and $1,000 a night.

“I used to just walk through the bar and men would come to me and ask for a dance. It was easy,” says the 23-year-old.

“I did really well for the first few years but then it got harder to get guys to buy a dance. It burns you out after a while. I would just go in for an hour or two and then leave.”

Lots of “Janes” (not her real name) have left the nightly grind. The number of licensed “burlesque dancers” in the city of Toronto has plummeted in the last decade. There were 1,254 certified strippers in 2007, down from 2,834 in 1998.

The exodus is hurting strip clubs, which now frequently lack both performers and patrons. Up to 10 clubs in Toronto have closed in the last five years.

There were reports last week that the industry’s hard times are behind “escalating” threats against Immigration Minister Diane Finley over Conservative legislation to keep foreign strippers out of Canada. The RCMP increased security around Finley, although the nature of the threats was not specified.

Ask those running the GTA strip joints why their dancers are exiting stage right and they offer these explanations:

The prevalence of free porn on the Internet.

The influx of illegal massage parlours.

The federal crackdown on foreign dancers.

The cost of the burlesque licences.

Tim Lambrinos, executive director of the Adult Entertainment Association of Canada, says strippers must pay a $348 annual licence fee and wait a week to get it, making it hard for Toronto clubs to attract dancers from out of town.

But even in Mississauga, where dancers don’t need a licence, strip clubs are losing their dancers and business.

With foreign dancers now restricted – only 17 exotic dancer permits have been issued since the Conservatives came to power, down from 423 in 2004 – Lambrinos says patrons are noticing a lack of variety on Toronto stages.

“Even though there are regular customers in clubs, there’s a demand to see something new, something exotic, a new face, a new dance. The industry is driven by the customer or patron demand, just like the comedy or music scene. Customers, they want to see new comedy, new bands, new fresh faces on the stage.”

To combat that problem the industry used to import foreign dancers. But Lambrinos and club owners say Bill C-17 – a proposed law that would prevent foreign workers deemed at risk of being sexually degraded or exploited from receiving work permits – has closed that door.

As a result, the Adult Entertainment Association of Canada has begun advertising for a government lobbyist and legal counsel to help find ways around the bill.

Jane put herself through college and then travelled the world on her earnings as a dancer in Ottawa and Toronto. She now works as a (fully clothed) bartender. Other strippers she knows have joined agencies that serve stag parties and other private functions.

She says the culture of the strip clubs changed in her few short years as a dancer. The demand for lucrative $20-a-song lap dances vanished.

While Lambrinos blames the city’s illegal massage parlours, Jane says most strippers prefer dancing to prostitution. She points to the Internet.

“Why would a guy go to a club and pay to sit there if he could get it all for free on his computer at home?”

The Internet is a destination for strippers, too, with some setting up their own websites.

Once in each other’s laps, both audience and performer now find the city’s strip clubs easy to avoid.