NU (Sticker) vs UC Davis ($$) Forum

[elizcbeth]

I honestly dont know anything about taxes so I left it out for ease. What would be a good percentage to use in order to calculate take home pay? 20%?

Don't go to law school. Go do something else for a few years.

But I have! I hope this isn't another don't go to law school at all argument... I know how much they take out of MY paycheck. How much do they take out for someone who gets paid $160000? A proportionate amount? *shrug*

[TheZoid]

Don't go to law school. Go do something else for a few years.[/quote]


But I have! I hope this isn't another don't go to law school at all argument... I know how much they take out of MY paycheck. How much do they take out for someone who gets paid $160000? A proportionate amount? *shrug*[/quote][/quote]

I believe the take home in NYC is like 90-95k on $160k.

[rickgrimes69]

I honestly dont know anything about taxes so I left it out for ease. What would be a good percentage to use in order to calculate take home pay? 20%?

Don't go to law school. Go do something else for a few years.

But I have! I hope this isn't another don't go to law school at all argument... I know how much they take out of MY paycheck. How much do they take out for someone who gets paid $160000? A proportionate amount? *shrug*

The point is that rather than apply critical thinking skills (aka google), you just decided it wasn't important and not worth factoring into your equation at all. IMO that demonstrates a pretty severe lack of real world experience.

[elizcbeth]

The point is that rather than apply critical thinking skills (aka google), you just decided it wasn't important and not worth factoring into your equation at all. IMO that demonstrates a pretty severe lack of real world experience.

Gotcha. Thanks for that! It was really just an oversight. I didn't know a good approximate tax rate so I forgot about it, and then I got too lazy to fix it after it was all uploaded. Fail

[jenesaislaw]

The point is that rather than apply critical thinking skills (aka google), you just decided it wasn't important and not worth factoring into your equation at all. IMO that demonstrates a pretty severe lack of real world experience.

Exactly x 100,000,000 x the marginal rate.

For real though, the posts you're seeing here share a similar bottom line: somebody who doesn't bother to figure out tax implications shouldn't throw 240k (I think you underestimated your COA, btw) at a degree. Thinking you'd pay it off in 3 years in any scenario is flat crazy. On a ten year plan, you're looking at 35k-40k (depending on the actual COA) per year. That's almost half of your take home. To do it 3 years, your payment (on 246k) would be $7600/month. That's your entire take home before you pay rent, eat, etc.

[Tiago Splitter]

The point is that rather than apply critical thinking skills (aka google), you just decided it wasn't important and not worth factoring into your equation at all. IMO that demonstrates a pretty severe lack of real world experience.

Exactly x 100,000,000 x the marginal rate.

For real though, the posts you're seeing here share a similar bottom line: somebody who doesn't bother to figure out tax implications shouldn't throw 240k (I think you underestimated your COA, btw) at a degree. Thinking you'd pay it off in 3 years in any scenario is flat crazy. On a ten year plan, you're looking at 35k-40k (depending on the actual COA) per year. That's almost half of your take home. To do it 3 years, your payment (on 246k) would be $7600/month. That's your entire take home before you pay rent, eat, etc.

Let's not start making up numbers now.

[jenesaislaw]

Which numbers do you dispute?

[elizcbeth]

Ok, thanks everyone. I really appreciate your feedback. Although I don't think that just because I overlooked take home pay in my calculations means that I am not intelligent enough for NU, it was still a huge oversight.

After recalculating my numbers, it looks like NU is only worth it if employment figures stay basically the same, which I don't trust that it will. I'm not sure if it's reasonable to assume that NU will continue to feed almost 50% of their class into $160000 jobs. Still at square one. Maybe I should just quit now and go to business school. haha Jokes.

Has anyone made a similar choice? How did it turn out?

[chasgoose]

Ok, thanks everyone. I really appreciate your feedback. Although I don't think that just because I overlooked take home pay in my calculations means that I am not intelligent enough for NU, it was still a huge oversight.

After recalculating my numbers, it looks like NU is only worth it if employment figures stay basically the same, which I don't trust that it will. I'm not sure if it's reasonable to assume that NU will continue to feed almost 50% of their class into $160000 jobs. Still at square one. Maybe I should just quit now and go to business school. haha Jokes.

Has anyone made a similar choice? How did it turn out?

I doubt we are going to see a significant downturn in hiring in the near future, unless the economy implodes again (which means we are probably screwed no matter what we are doing) most law firms have reduced their employee levels to far more sustainable numbers post-2008 and they aren't going to want to get back into the 2008 situation anytime soon, so the conservative hiring model is going to continue. Unless we have a massive economic bubble develop again (which, given the current economic state seems unlikely) and law firms start hiring like crazy in the next few years, you probably can feel pretty comfortable that NU is going to stay at the 50% mark at least. If you are comfortable with that number, than going to law school now isn't a terrible decision.

[tjddk]

Ok, thanks everyone. I really appreciate your feedback. Although I don't think that just because I overlooked take home pay in my calculations means that I am not intelligent enough for NU, it was still a huge oversight.

After recalculating my numbers, it looks like NU is only worth it if employment figures stay basically the same, which I don't trust that it will. I'm not sure if it's reasonable to assume that NU will continue to feed almost 50% of their class into $160000 jobs. Still at square one. Maybe I should just quit now and go to business school. haha Jokes.

Has anyone made a similar choice? How did it turn out?

I doubt we are going to see a significant downturn in hiring in the near future, unless the economy implodes again (which means we are probably screwed no matter what we are doing) most law firms have reduced their employee levels to far more sustainable numbers post-2008 and they aren't going to want to get back into the 2008 situation anytime soon, so the conservative hiring model is going to continue. Unless we have a massive economic bubble develop again (which, given the current economic state seems unlikely) and law firms start hiring like crazy in the next few years, you probably can feel pretty comfortable that NU is going to stay at the 50% mark at least. If you are comfortable with that number, than going to law school now isn't a terrible decision.

Also keep in mind that if you assume NU's employment figures may drop, you should assume Davis' numbers could drop too, except that they were much worse than NU's to begin with. I voted NU because between the two options given, I felt it would be better to have a job and eventually be able to pay off loans than to be underemployed/unemployed. And keep in mind that a 10 year repayment doesn't mean you have to do biglaw for 10 years. Basically what I'm saying is, NU at sticker is scary and not for everybody, but every negative you've mentioned about NU, you can say about UC Davis and add "but worse." Even with the scholarship from Davis, its employment numbers still make it a risky bet, IMO.

[Tiago Splitter]

Which numbers do you dispute?

$7600 as take home

[kerflux]

Ok, thanks everyone. I really appreciate your feedback. Although I don't think that just because I overlooked take home pay in my calculations means that I am not intelligent enough for NU, it was still a huge oversight.

very insightful people, capable of telling whether or not you're at the right stage in your life to attend law school by analyzing a single one of your posts.

anyway, I've been dealing with essentially the same exact decision, and I'm going with NU. I had a hard time turning down the better employment prospects, networking opportunities, and the prestige. Alternately, Davis is a great college town, great place to spend 3 years... I just think NU is ultimately going to open more doors, in the long run

[jenesaislaw]

Which numbers do you dispute?

$7600 as take home

That's 96.2k for the year, which is the estimate given above. Might be off by 1k a month, which isn't insubstantial but still not leaving enough to pay down 246k in 3 years.

[elizcbeth]

Which numbers do you dispute?

$7600 as take home

That's 96.2k for the year, which is the estimate given above. Might be off by 1k a month, which isn't insubstantial but still not leaving enough to pay down 246k in 3 years.

9. I am also ok with paying aggresively for ~3 years and then very slowly after that.

I think you missed this part. I can see where you got confused though.

[GueritaPeloChino]

I'm glad i found this thread.

[rickgrimes69]

I'm glad i found this thread.

Thanks for letting us know.

[Hutz_and_Goodman]

Both of these are risky options. If I had a gun to my head I'd pick NU, but if you have the option to wait a year and reapply that would be better. Even if you can't get $$ from a T14 you can get a full ride or more at a lesser school that is still decent (top 50). From either school the job prospects may be dire and you'll have six figures of debt.

Also, if you want to end up in CA you will still likely have a tough time from Davis. The CA legal market is over saturated and UC Davis is at best the fifth strongest law school in the state (Stanford, berkeley, UCLA, USC). So you would need to be top 20% at the minimum and probably top 10% to be competitive for CA big law.