Fantastic Front Page WSJ Article on Employment Prospects Post-Law School

[Americanski]

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I have never disputed that FA for law school works differently than that for undergrad. But I don’t think that’s a relevant point.

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<p>It’s relevant because there is no need-based financial aid for law school, and because the loans are taken out by the student, not their parents. So the initial claim that law school graduates were somehow in the same position as college graduates is unreasonable. The average college student has less than 1/4th the debt of the average law student. It is almost impossible for an undergrad to end up with as much debt as the average law student has.</p>

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And that’s why I didn’t talk about PhD programs. You haven’t demonstrated that pharmacists have the kinds of fellowships and TAships available to PhD students.

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<p>It’s not really my job to disprove baseless conjecture. I think it’s pretty clear that graduates of four-year schools do not necessarily have more debt than graduates of three-year schools. You’re the one claiming the analogy; it’s not especially persuasive that your only evidence is that neither of us knows for a fact that it isn’t true. </p>

<p>And in any event, the debt itself isn’t the issue so much as the inability to pay it back. What is the un- and under-employment rate for pharmacists? How many pharmacy or optometry schools grade on a curve designed to fail out some percentage of the class each year? How many entering pharmacy and optometry students either fail out or fail to ever be licensed? How many of the ones who do graduate and are licensed simply cannot find work in their field? How many of them end up making $20 an hour with no job security, hope for advancement or benefits? </p>

<p>Another difference is that there aren’t $160K entry-level jobs in these fields. There is a level of risk and competition in law that doesn’t exist in many other places. </p>

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Lots of law students are night students. By their very nature, they don’t carry very much debt, because they hold a fulltime job while studying and hence have a source of income that helps to reduce their debt level.

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<p>How many is “lots?” Do you have even any idea how many law students are night students? It also takes them (at least) four years to graduate. You provide no evidence that part-time students, who are a small minority of all students, actually have less debt. </p>

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Certainly, I agree that the lawyers who don’t do well are not doing well. That’s a simple tautology. But my point still stands - the average lawyer does better than the average vet or pharmacist. That is something that the data is quite clear about.

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<p>The point is that lawyers who aren’t doing well are doing worse than pharmacists or optometrists who aren’t doing well. The average is completely irrelevant when you’re asking what happens to the people at the bottom, which is the subject of the article. And again, law school graduates who cannot find work as lawyers aren’t included.</p>

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You continually try to assert that law student problems are somehow unique, when in fact I think I have shown that others (i.e. pharmacists, vets) have comparable problems.

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<p>No, you haven’t, because they simply don’t. In fact, thinking that law is just like these other fields is precisely the mistake that many people are making. If they believe the legal profession is anything like pharmacy or optometry, and decide to attend a low-ranked law school, they’re in for some serious disappointment.</p>