Hmmmm. So there's the plain fact that children's games reflect the reality around them. The only reason we don't mind them playing cowboys/indians is because the conflict is no longer real to us, all the indians being dead. Cops/robbers is OK too, since the prohibiition and the great depression is not even a dim memory.
But as to the emerging trope of pimps and ho's, I haven't much of a clue; it's all a jumble of converging impressions:
-- The majority of rock videos now feature these stereotypes. -- Starting in the eighties, the vamp look (an archetype) started to merge with the slut look. -- The notion of being "bought" is played more and more like a compliment and less like an insult -- The question increasingly is not whether we are all whores but what kind/how much.
So, I would go ahead and say that the collective subconscious has registered the fact that capital has assimilated all, and expresses that perception in identifying with pimps and hos. Since, structurally speaking, "pimp and ho" embrace all possibilities in this economy. A new spin on master/slave perhaps. Not sure why the sexual element is there.
In fact, one of the best movies I saw last year was "Hustle and Flow," a movie about pimps and hos that revolved around the idea of solidarity between pimp and hos rather than around the idea of exploitation. An interesting movie, well worth seeing. Everyone at my daughter's school seems to be singing the chorus from the main song in that movie.
You know it's hard out here for a pimp, When he's just trying to pay the money for the rent, With his cadillac and gas money spent, You know there's a whole lot of bitches jumping shift.
Joanna