Posted 8/27/2009 4:27 am
The fact is the USA is entering a new stage in it's economic development, which will look like the UK in 1976. Where there is a perma decline of jobs and the economy stays sh-tty for decades.
You could make $60k a year easy just hanging out at the Tombs or whatever other big city prison, just processing two or three plea bargains a day. Once you get all the paper work routine down pat you could do it in your sleep.
That's true. That's similar to guys whose practices are almost entirely municipal court practices.
One advantage of municipal court, beside the fact that it's easy and routine, is that you don't have to lay out money for cases and you get paid right away. Even diddly sh-t personal injury cases in superior court take years before they go to court or are settled. Municipal court cases are generally done in weeks or months.
There is a demand for legal services all over the country, and the vast majority of practicing lawyers didn't go to Harvard or Yale.
I can definitely endorse the idea of a decent 9-5. I'm on track to make about $85K this year. On top of the pay, I have 31 paid days off over the course of the year. Because I work 4 10 hour days, I have take a three day weekend twice a month and work overtime on the other two. It's nice having little vacations once or twice a month. I take motorcycle camping trips, go canoeing, take a couple days off and see the city. Go to a hockey game, catch a concert, go to the book store and dig around for a few hours, that kind of thing.
Sometimes the OT is a pain in the ass and I'm tired, but how many hours did I work for free when I was tired as a white collar serf? I did the same hours or more for $30-36K for a lot of years. In my best years, it was 60-70K. Whoopee. And a heart attack waiting in wing with all the uncertainty.
I couldn't imagine throwing that life away for another $35K a year. How much would my life change to the upside for that money? Would I go from driving a $15,000 car to a $55,000 car? Maybe... but that's not such a huge difference that I want to work another 31 days a year and give up all my three day weekends. Do I go from a $1600 a month apartment to a $1975 a month apartment? Do I buy my lunchmeats from the rack that looks like it was ground and pressed to the rack that looks like it was sliced?
f-ck that.
I can upgrade my degree and make $100K doing 40 hours a week. Imagine three day weekends EVERY week, plus ANOTHER 31 paid days off a year. Teachers don't get this kind of time off.
And let's consider the pension. I did the math the other day, and my (permanent) pension payout spits out about the same amount of money that $850K in five-year Treasuries would pay out. Plus social security, plus anything in the stock market...
Lawyers create their own demand. They're like hitmen/bodyguards. The more hitmen on the loose the more the demand for bodyguards. That's what lawyers do, they hit people with lawsuits and those people have to lawyer up. There's no end to this process, at least not so long as everyone isn't bankrupt. Eventually lawyers can bring every aspect of society to a halt, everyone paralyzed by fear of litigation.
Japan gets by with far fewer lawyers. So does europe. Those are advanced societies, so there's nothing about the modern world that requires every dispute be litigated.
Posted 8/27/2009 1:33 pm
Imagine graduating at the bottom of you class at an IVY law school now (or even in the future). You are pretty much f-cked because even the bottom feeder law jobs are going to people with better grades or even lower tier schools. You have 230K of debt(which could buy a nice 4 bd house in many areas of the country) and are pretty much unemployable. You make fun of Milton but there will always be a need for someone to baby sit a server in some government agency for 60-70Kyr.
Even if you dropped out of highschool and put your mind to retail for 8 years you can make 50K (or even more) as a store manager, and not have massive debt to boot.
I can't think of anything with more pwonage on earth, even skeetmopping sounds like a better career.
Posted 3/9/2012 5:52 am
Law school meant easy high pay job/you are in great demand when most people in the US just finished high school and had a job. Now 1/3 of Americans have a BA/BS. I don't know the number but with so many law schools maybe 10% of the US population has a law degree?
There are just too many lawyers, too many law schools, and too many people becoming lawyers each year.....DUH!
Finally someone else saying it.
