<p>my son is who is HS sophomore is interested in a legal career and my wife talked to lawyer acquaintance about it. His advice was either go to a top law school (top 20) and graduate within the top 60% or go to a second tier law school (20-40) and graduate within the top 25%. In his opinion “Don’t even waste your money on any other law school unless you want to work for the firm on the back cover of the yellow pages book or the ones running ads on TV. If you cannot be in the top, may be you need to think of a different profession.”</p>
<p>Also, remember a lot of legal work is now being outsourced. Yes, you can have a lawyer in India trained in British Law write the briefs, which a lawyer here will review. World is indeed changing.</p>
<p>^^^^^ What he said he was that “Yes you make a fortune if your name is on the back pages, not if you work for that firm”. Apparently a lot of the lawyers who are employees (not partners) do not make that much</p>
<p>Yes and no. What I hear from friends at our state flagship law school (one of the best of the publics) is that the bigger law firms always prefer to hire young lawyers just out of law school. They like to train them and acculturate them to the firm’s way of doing things. And although they’re paid handsomely, they’re paid less than more senior people, so they add more to the firm’s profitability. </p>
<p>What people at the law school are most concerned about is not the students who will be graduating law school in two or three years, because by then the economy should be back and the law firms should be hiring again, and the newly minted lawyers will be first in line for those entry-level jobs. What they fear is a “lost generation” of people who graduated law school last year, this year, and possibly next year, and ended up unemployed, underemployed in part time and/or temp jobs, or employed in some non-legal setting. Those folks may have a harder time making it back into the mainstream of the profession. Then there are the more senior lawyers who were let go by their firms as an economy move. They won’t be competing for the entry-level associate jobs; they’ll have to come in, if at all, as lateral hires, a kind of hiring many law firms don’t do very often except for established stars. In addition to competing against a lot of similarly situated people, they’ll also be under suspicion about the reasons for their dismissal, i.e., would their firm have let them go if they were among the most productive (and profitable) people in the firm? A lot of these people will need to settle for reduced expectations and lower salaries at smaller firms, or as solo practitioners. As I said earlier, it’s a funny market. The more experienced people don’t always have an advantage, because there’s a distinct market for entry-level hires.</p>
<p>Also keep in mind that there’s not really a single national market for lawyers. It’s more like a bunch of local/regional markets, with only a relatively small amount of lateral movement across markets. How difficult it is to get a good lawyering job depends on the nature of the local market and current market conditions, which vary considerably. Here in the Twin Cities we’ve got a large and generally thriving legal community with a number of big and highly regarded firms with national and international client bases, as well as branches of some of the top NY, Chicago, and LA firms; so graduates of our local flagship tend to do very well. Iowa, on the other hand, which is a law school of roughly comparable quality, is in a much smaller, less diverse, and less vibrant legal market, so I imagine Iowa ends up exporting a lot of its top grads to Chicago, the Twin Cities, maybe Kansas City. In good times I suspect the Iowa grads do pretty well. Not so sure about now.</p>
<p>The strong arm! (As opposed to Jim Adler, the Texas hammer!)</p>
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<p>But not so much anymore. Because after they are trained (year 2-3) the headhunters descend like vultures and steal them. So more and more firms are adopting a “let someone else train them” philosophy.</p>
<p>UP TO THE MINUTE NEWS:</p>
<p>I think we had seven law clerks last summer, spread among our various offices. We gave three offers and today we found out that all three accepted. </p>
<p>So…if each of 40 firms in the state hire an average of 3 novice lawyers, that is 120 with jobs.</p>
<p>Compare with my class, when I think my firm hired in the nighborhood of 30 summer clerks and everyone who didn’t utterly tick off a partner or get arrested over the summer got offers…about half accepted the offers every year. So 1985 new hires: 15. 2011 new hires: 3 (and the size of the firm has probably tripled since 85).</p>
<p>I currently attend law school and I can speak to the potential income v. law school debt ratio. I had about 60k in student loans leaving undergrad and then continued onto law school this past fall. My student loans are approx. 40k per year for law school (120k total just for my JD and about 200k total!!!). Realistically, most attorneys dont make as much as one might think. I am hoping to make about $40-50k per year out of school, which doesn’t seem like that much when I have a mortgage of student loan debt coming each month. Obviously, this is not ideal.</p>
<p>However, I agree with some of the previous posts that said do what you love. That is what I did. My late father was an attorney and for most of my life told me not to do it because of the debt incurred. He also preached do what makes you happy. I know law school may not be the best financial decision for people like me but I just can’t imagine doing anything else. I’d rather be in debt but enjoy my job than be slightly more economically free and hate showing up to work everyday. I am only 24 years old and cant imagine spending the next 40 years doing something I hate regardless of what it pays. Bottom line is definitely look at the debt (because it is serious, very serious) but do what you love. Even if you can’t find a job as an attorney right away having a JD looks good when applying for other jobs. It shows an ability to succeed academically, think critically, and problem solve, which last I time checked were all desirable job skills.</p>
<p>I’m currently a lawyer and have been for almost 30 years (yikes I am old!) I’m a public interest lawyer in a pretty well paying Washington DC non-profit, and my H is also a lawyer in a non-profit, and we know tons of lawyers in private practice as well. I;ve been active in the ABA and with the trial lawyers and we have tons of law students working for us all the time.</p>
<p>The market is awful. Our law clerks can’t find jobs. That is, most of them can’t. Nor can attorneys who are laid off – even ones with stellar credentials, both academic and career. Students can’t even get summer jobs, and compete for unpaid internships, which is really hard on them I think.</p>
<p>I would say, as others have, that with the economy this uncertain, it is very difficult to decide on graduate school based solely on the job market. I would not advise anyone to go to law school UNLESS the person truly wants to study the law or become a lawyer as a personal goal. Also, what law school one goes to really makes a difference in getting a job (I am sorry to say). Big law firms look to the nationally ranked schools and lesser ranked schools mean nothing to them – unless a partner happened to go to one of them.</p>
<p>Local markets can be different – then local law schools can have a good reputation, but you need to know which ones do and which ones don’t. Many law schools just keep churning out graduates and they manipulate the numbers to make it look like they have higher employment rates than they do.</p>
<p>Another thing to keep in mind is that many law school have loan forgiveness programs for graduates who go into public interest law. (I happen to be, I believe, the very first student in the country to benefit from such a program from the first school to do that! It was experimental then, and works better now. But only some schools do this.)</p>
<p>If I were considering law school, I might take a year off and try and work as a paralegal for a year and see if I liked it, or combine other work with some volunteer time at my local legal services or legal aid office. If you can find a mentor before you go, the whole experience will be more meaningful, and you will make a better choice.</p>
<p>The United States has far more lawyers per capita than any other nation in the world.</p>
<p>We have way too many lawyers. </p>
<p>If you live away from the north east almost half of the local TV commercials are from lawyers encouraging people to bring law suits. It’s sickening. </p>
<p>More up to the minute news: Our Attorney General’s Office is about to close applications on the ONE position it has for a lawyer. It pays $51k (it is ‘slightly’ negotiable, but that’s what they are paying the new hires this year, but with pretty good government benefits, which, however, have shrunk recently). They are just swamped with applicants from all across the U.S. (And, from what I’m told, they are not likely to hire any more any time soon - no one is leaving if they can help it, and the Legislature is about to cut their budget.)</p>
<p>I love it when people who have probably never been to medical school are so quick to suggest it as an alternative to law school. The skills sets are not interchangeable nor are the rewards of the jobs. Gee, I really wanted to be a litigator but I think I’ll be a urologist instead? Really?</p>
<p>The economy is in the toilet. Lots of careers are not what they used to be. The legal profession is changing. Medicine is changing. Out of all the people in my med school class whom I keep up with, only one child (out of maybe 25) is thinking of medicine… hmm. </p>
<p>If you do everything you do in life because of fear, you will be terrible at what you do and then it doesn’t really matter what the statistics say, does it?</p>
<p>Well said, robyrm2. I have practiced law (in-house) for over 30 years and one of my main goals in college was to NOT have to take anything significantly resembling math or science! The idea of me in medical school is simply hilarious. Not to mention the whole issue of needles…</p>
<p>Now, more than ever, going to a top 20 law school really matters. Firms can be very selective and just circular file top student resumes from 2nd tier schools and state flagships. It is nice to say do what you love but tell that to an unemployed or under-employed lawyer.</p>
<p>There are jobs for lawyers, out there. They’re just may not be in D.C. or New York or in major cities in the North East, or with major law firms.</p>
<p>The question is what is your vision of “success”? Is big money or power or fame or living and working in a major coastal city the goal? </p>
<p>I have a niece who interned in a major law firm for a summer, and decided that was NOT the route she wanted. She is a lawyer in a small town in the midwest. She joined a very small practice, one of the two partners is retiring, and she is his replacement. Very family friendly, low key, slower pace of life…</p>
<p>"Now, more than ever, going to a top 20 law school really matters. "</p>
<p>Not entirely. I know a number of students who regret having declined attractive scholarship offers from second tier schools in favor of taking out loans to pay full-tuition at a top school. Each was a solid but not stellar student (3.2 - 3.3 gpa), has passed the NY bar and remains unemployed - - with law school debt of $100k - $120K. </p>
<p>While the prospects for grads from T1 law schools are undeniably better than those from T2 schools, the wiser choice for students deciding b/w full-freight at T1 and full-tuition scholarship at T2 would be – as deep-throat advised Woodward and Bernstein - - follow the money.</p>
<p>The problem with the above questions is that it ignores some serious problems recent law school grads and students face…ginormous education loan debt($200k+ at a private…$100k+ at most publics), FA/scholarships that tend to be far less generous proportionally than undergrad, and the fact most scholarships have very onerous terms. </p>
<p>These terms include staying in top 1/3 or even 10% of class at the end of each year or lose it. Considering all classes are graded on a strict curve and many law schools place all the scholarship students in the same sections to deliberately force most to lose their schollys after one year…those schollys aren’t as helpful as they may seem to be at first glance. </p>
<p>And living in a cheaper COL area matters little when you have $100k-$200K+ debt hanging over your head and you’re working a small firm/solo job where you’d be lucky to be making $40-50k/year. </p>
<p>All these factors are reasons why even the most anti-biglaw people I knew ended up working there after graduating from T-14 law schools if they can land those jobs…</p>
<p>Well, the topic on this thread is supply and demand of lawyers. There are jobs out there, they just aren’t where you want to live, and they may not pay what you want to earn. This reminds me of the undergrad threads where people gripe about being unable to repay their huge loans from expensive private colleges. </p>
<p>In this new economy, which I personally think is here to stay, cost of law school may become a more important consideration than it has been in the past.</p>
<p>There is a massive oversupply of lawyers in the US that is being fueled by a massive oversupply of law schools. </p>
<p>The demand side is unlikely to go up any time soon so unless law schools drastically reduce class size or a bunch of schools are simply shut down then the issue is here to stay. </p>
<p>However, universities like their law schools. They’re cheap to run (relative to say a med school, science or engineering), bring in a lot of student sourced revenue (generally via loans) (science grad students are usually funded by gov’t grants that are in limited supply) and the incremental cost of packing in some more students into a law class is virtually zero (some more photocopies for the lecture handouts perhaps vs science or med school which requires huge expense for each additional student). Consequently there’s every incentive for law schools to pump out as many new lawyers as possible and that’s exactly what happened.</p>
<p>There also simply aren’t that many jobs out there that pay the levels required to justify the extraordinary levels of debt taken on by the typical law student these days. Going $150k into debt for a job that often might pay $65k just doesn’t make sense. </p>
<p>Of course one doesn’t have to be an attorney, but the JD simply isn’t valued as much outside law as many seem to think. Preference would typically be given to someone that developed threes years of relevant experience during the time another candidate was getting a JD.</p>
<p>If you can attend law school without significant debt then it takes a lot of the pressure off… But if you need huge loans be very very careful.</p>
<p>I’ve hired at NYC law firms for almost 20 years and I would say for any student who has to borrow to go to law school DON’T DO IT!!! I can’t tell you how many dozens of lawyers who graduated from top schools are currently working as $20 per hour temps reviewing documents in basements with no benefits and getting no respect and having no future. The entire industry has and is contracting and restructuring If you’re independently wealthy and won’t even miss the tuition, a law degree is a great investment. If you need to pay back loans and have the luxuries of a roof over your head and food on your table, do something else. There is a blog called abovethelaw. com which will give you a lot of insight.</p>
<p>There was a recent NY Times magazine article that looked at students sacrificing prestige for merit scholarships at lower tiered schools to reduce their debt. Just like Cobrat mentions in post #36, the majority of the entering class was often offered this deal but the curve made it impossible for many to keep up the required GPA. Now they are saddled with the debt and a less prestigious 2nd or 3rd tier degree. Seems like many thought they were scammed and would have been better off going to the best school that accepted them.</p>