<p>Are there any lawyers that work a regular 9 to 5 hours, 5 days a week, and still make between a 85,000 to 100,000?</p>
<p>I'm sure that it's possible, but I've certainly never met an attorney who makes that much money for working those short hours.</p>
<p>I have a friend who worked for the SEC. After several years, her benefits got better and she was given every other friday off. Her compensation was about 80,000 dollars but that was also in New York City where the cost of living is extremely high.</p>
<p>In general, you earn what you're worth in the American economy and being a lawyer is no different. If you want to make money, prepare to put in the hours.</p>
<p>But that is the thing, I want to work a normal nine to five, and I am really not into making over 100 grand. I think anything between 85-95k is fine for me. Hopefully more posters can give me insight</p>
<p>well it depends. the first thing youd have to realize is that you'd have to work in a private practice to work 9-5. otherwise it would be incredibly unlikely that you'd be able to work those hours. So figuring your in a private practice - how much do u charge an hour? if you work 9-5 you're probably billing around 25 hours a week - or less. If you charge $125/hour and work about 48 weeks a year at 25 hours a week, you'd gross $150,000. but now you have to subtract rent for an office - all the supplies - ...secretary? So taking all that away, you could really only be making $70,000 a year or less - and you don't have benefits. of course that goes up if you have a partner - your expenses are effectively halved.</p>
<p>Now to the crux of the matter. Can you maintain a private firm only working 40 hours a week? I don't know about that.</p>
<p>i really think you first have to decide why it is you want to be a lawyer -- and then decide if the type of legal job you would have to have in order to have regular hours is compatible with why it is you want to be a lawyer. if the whole reason you want to be a lawyer is because you think it is an easy why to make a good living, i would suggest you reconsider.</p>
<p>law school is expensive and it is stressful.
as a lawyer it is your job to serve your clients - and that often can lead to irregular hours. many people think of gov't jobs as less hour intense, though that would in fact vary considerably by the type of position -- same for in-house corp jobs. the trade-off for regular hours may be positions with less responsibility.<br>
$85,000-$100,000 may sound like it is on the lower end of what some people contemplating law school are thinking in terms of -- but it is still a lot of money -- is this your goal straight out of school or 10 years out?<br>
assume 40 hours a week times 50 weeks a year (let's say you take 2 weeks vacation) -- that's 2000 hours (even assuming you actually work every minute you are in the office). $50 an hour is a pretty good take home rate -- why would you expect that for a job in which your responsibilities are such that you leave at 5 every day?</p>
<p>personally, i just don't think anyone should go into law thinking they are going to end up working a 40 hour week. i've said this before on other threads -- why go in to a profession with the express goal of trying to find a job that is atypical for that profession?</p>