LOL at "government" work Forum

[bjsesq]

My problem isn't with the analysis of how bad things are, they are bad, but with the objectively retarded claim that going to law school is insane. In some circumstances, it's a pretty damn good idea.

talk about poor rhetoric. bjsesq - please stop using the word "retarded" to characterize another's argument, no matter how weak the argument is. The word is disparaging and attacking someone's argument with a cheap stock phrase lowers your credibility in the eyes of your readers.

This isn't an appellate brief, it's the internet. Don't be retarded.

lol at u writing an apellate brief

Did 'em for law school, not for a court. C'mon, stop being retarded.

[robotclubmember]

The implication in both of those posts is that all government work is unpaid. Hiring a few interns does not equal filling their staffs with tons of unemployed people. Even if it makes sense from the perspective of government, it wouldn't make sense for the lawyers themselves. People aren't going to choose starving to death over moving in to a different career track (unless you think the hordes of unemployed attorneys in your scenario will be fed by mana from heaven).

now now. i call that flair, not hyperbole :p

apparently NJ feels that its new unpaid DA assistants will be fed by mana from heaven.

for about half of the people in the legal profession it never "made sense" to go in the first place. (when i say half i base that off of 2010 JD class: 27% temp, 11% part-time, 13% unemployed). maybe this isn't a matter strictly of "what makes sense."

[sunynp]

Sonia Cunha, career services director at Seton Hall University School of Law, sees two sides to the concept of unpaid jobs.

She says it is "problematic," practically and ideologically, for some law graduates to consider volunteer legal work.

Many graduates -- who are saddled with student-loan debt, facing living expenses or simply averse to the idea of working for free -- recoil at counselors' suggestions that they take an unpaid position, even part time, she says.

Still, Cunha calls the special assistant program "a wonderful idea" and "a great opportunity."

"When you're employed, you're more marketable to the next employer," Cunha says. "I always say, validate the J.D., or try to validate the J.D." by working in law, rather than in an outside field, she adds.

LOL at a Seton Hall JD needing to be "validated"- what is it, a voucher for free parking?

At least that toilet is only charging 46 K a year to end up earning a salary of 0 dollars.

Good areyouinsane stuff here.
And such typical career services bs. I'm not sure the marketability of even a fully "validated" Seton Hall JD will improve much after being "employed" for free or for a ridiculously low salary.

Because Seton Hall is quoted in the article I looked up what USNews says about them, just to see what is out there:

The School of Law at Seton Hall University has an application deadline of April 1. The full-time program application fee at the School of Law at Seton Hall University is $65. The part-time program application fee at the School of Law at Seton Hall University is $65. Its tuition is full-time: $45,048 per year and part-time: $33,981 per year. The student-faculty ratio is 14.0:1. The School of Law at Seton Hall University has 140 full- and part-time faculty on staff. Of the 2009 graduates, 79.9 percent were employed at graduation.

Careers
Graduates known to be employed at graduation 79.9% - Medium
Median private sector starting salary $145,000
Median public service starting salary $40,746

http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandr ... sity-03099

The career services page of the Seton Hall Law website simply says:

ABOUT THE OFFICE OF CAREER SERVICES
Our mission is to help students and alumni to meet their career goals. A couple indications of our success are the high-placement rate enjoyed by Seton Hall Law graduates and the large percentage of our students who obtain judicial clerkships. We encourage you to take advantage of all we have to offer. Please contact us today or come in to visit.

http://law.shu.edu/CareersInLaw/index.cfm

Though reading the wikipedia page for Seton Hall under the subheading controversies does reference this article from last summer:
http://www.nj.com/business/index.ssf/20 ... y_the.html

So I don't know. I am really undecided on how much information is considered by the general public and the general college student applying to law school.

Sorry if I am getting off-topic here.

by the way the linked article about the law school scam also mentions that there was a career fact sheet on the Seton Hall Law site last summer, but it seems to have been taken down. At least I couldn't find it.

[bjsesq]

now now. i call that flair, not hyperbole :p

Well done.

[Bill Cosby]

The implication in both of those posts is that all government work is unpaid. Hiring a few interns does not equal filling their staffs with tons of unemployed people. Even if it makes sense from the perspective of government, it wouldn't make sense for the lawyers themselves. People aren't going to choose starving to death over moving in to a different career track (unless you think the hordes of unemployed attorneys in your scenario will be fed by mana from heaven).

now now. i call that flair, not hyperbole :p

apparently NJ feels that its new unpaid DA assistants will be fed by mana from heaven.

for about half of the people in the legal profession it never "made sense" to go in the first place. (when i say half i base that off of 2010 JD class: 27% temp, 11% part-time, 13% unemployed). maybe this isn't a matter strictly of "what makes sense."

Which is based on information asymmetry. That'll work itself out of the system with time.

[crossarmant]

Everyone on her likes to scream to everyone else, don't go to law school; but you know, most of the people on here are the one's who are making sound decisions with law schools. They're most likely the ones to succeed in school and do well enough for themselves. It's the poor yobs who don't look into the endeavor, the ~25,000 students who enroll in TTTs and TTTTs every year, the ones enrolling in non-ABA accredited schools, the one's who have solid grades and LSAT scores who enroll in a good law school but are K-JDers who just want to continue the party in undergrad... It's these people who are the ones making uninformed decisions. And unfortunately, regardless of all the shouting, the scare tactics, the boisterous debate, not a single one of these people will change their course because they won't see any of it or care.

I mean, there are more people enrolled as 1Ls at Cooley than the entire T6 combined, It's the gigantic surplus of cut-rate schools that the ABA keep accrediting that is causing such a terrible market for attorneys and that will no be fixed by an amount of whistle blowing on forum boards. For every person you may scare off from law school, there are going to be two less competent people who take their spot. As long as there are seats in law schools, those seats will be filled. No amount of employment disclosure or honesty will prevent them from filling, it has to be action from the ABA and U.S. Government preventing more law schools from opening and discrediting a number of them already functioning.

[Shammis]

A couple of things...

Gov't work is not going to be a safe haven with the debt and spending cuts coming everyones way. Uncle Sam is screwed...or all those gunning for Biglaw's salaries are screwed b/c of tax hikes (I hope I'm lucky enough to be taxed that much lol).

The economy is crap, we all have to take that into consideration. That being said, not everyone's position is the same in life, so these sweeping claims of death and destuction (and that anyone going into the legal profession is a misguided fool) are ridiculous (and pissing me off). Some people have connections or (gasp!) a passion for the law. Why do people persue a Masters in theology? Job prospects are even worse there, but some people actually want to learn and study a given subject...It just so happens that a law degree is more marketable than most lib arts degrees, and people can do more with it than without it. Sure a traditional route might not be available to everyone, but if you're afraid to rely on yourself and what you learn in LS, then you don't deserve to do well anyway. Nut up. Life's hard. Stop complaining. Try networking for a job instead of complaining on TLS all day. If you are going to wait on the sidelines for everything to be rainbows and sunshowers you'll lead a very sad life if you truly wanted to be a lawyer (or really wanted to do something with a law degree).

LOL at the volunteer positions by the way. That's terrible, but also why I'm not expecting bigGov to hold my hand. I would love to work for a gov't agency, but I just dont see that as a viable option in the near future.

[A'nold]

Oh, looky here. Right on schedule. I told everyone dude was a troll on the other thread and took heat for it.

Is this the start of the new "JDU infiltration of TLS" plan? I saw the poster mention Seton Hall, every JDU'ers favorite school to bash. What do you guys call the dean, the oil can man or something like that?

[bjsesq]

Oh, looky here. Right on schedule. I told everyone dude was a troll on the other thread and took heat for it.

Is this the start of the new "JDU infiltration of TLS" plan? I saw the poster mention Seton Hall, every JDU'ers favorite school to bash. What do you guys call the dean, the oil can man or something like that?

Going to law school is completely insane. We're all gonna die.

Retarded.

[Voltaire]

Anyone trying to get any government job in NJ while Christie is governor is probably screwed. From police guy (Zomg 80k/yr state trooper) to teacher to lawyer to janitor.

[Shammis]

Going to law school is completely insane. We're all gonna die.

Retarded.

Damn you! Im at work and you made me lol in front of my boss.

[bouakedojo]

.

[bjsesq]

I wonder if LRAP at schools that have it would pick up loan payments for those that take these types of jobs.

Not at NU. Those are considered volunteer positions, and not employment. No LRAP love.

Wonder if you could get into the IBR plan and have it qualify for a year's worth of payments on the 10 year Public Service Loan Forgiveness.

Hard to say. Anything I say after this point is bullshit wishing: it would seem reasonable to allow it, and I hope they would.

[robotclubmember]

i honestly believe people will make a better decision when they are furnished with better information. closing law schools is not a functional solution. it is the best one but it is one that no one has the means to compel. there should be a freeze on new accreditations though.

there are two factors: one is that law school loans need to be dischargeable. by offering federally backed loans, the law schools have no "skin in the game" over the success of their students. a good system would be one in which the law schools themselves are required to finance the education. few 22-year olds would be offered $175K for a home loan so why is this different? the debt isn't even collateralized. increasing the supply of easy money for a legal education has allowed for 317% inflation of law school tuition from 1989 to 2009 as well. throwing taxpayer money down on this allows for the federally backed loan to serve as a wealth transfer vehicle from students who have no wealth to schools that lie about their prospects to entice students to consume their product.

which brings me to the second point: employment reporting standards need to be reformed. i won't rehash my opinion on that it's stated above. but i honestly believe that when consumers are given a realistic set of facts, they will reject a poor product. i believe in efficient markets. but on a school-by-school basis, each school systematically obfuscates its data, and you can never accuse them of lying because the data is in no way audited or overseen. it should be criminal, honestly.

whistleblowing on a forum does help people make better decisions. someone needs to hold the law school's accountable after all. the issue is objectively an injustice against law school applicants, who enter into a serious financial investment with inaccurate data published by the seller of said services. this is a consumer rights issue as much as an economic issue and while whistleblowing on a forum does less than i'd like, it doesn't do nothing. i hope one day i'll be able to find a better venue that's less crowded with fallacious logic (ad hominem, false dilemma, straw man and error if composition are the best ones).

[areyouinsane]

The implication in both of those posts is that all government work is unpaid. Hiring a few interns does not equal filling their staffs with tons of unemployed people. Even if it makes sense from the perspective of government, it wouldn't make sense for the lawyers themselves. People aren't going to choose starving to death over moving in to a different career track (unless you think the hordes of unemployed attorneys in your scenario will be fed by mana from heaven).

Um, it's more than a "few interns": did you read the linked article about the NJ Attorney General's Office:

http://blogs.findlaw.com/strategist/200 ... teers.html

At the time the article was printed, they already had 60 admitted lawyers working for free, and noted that over 100 people had applied. We can thus infer that even among those willing to work for free, positions may not be available. A former co-worker of mine is actually a paid NJ assistant AG, and she told me this program now has over 200 lawyers working for free (both part-and-full time).

Did you also read the article re: the Camden NJ DA's office? 18 lawyers axed already in 2011, in what's the most crime ridden, dangerous city in America. These folks weren't canned for lack of work: large states like NJ are simply piss broke and getting broker. NJ Legal Aid cut 25% of it's lawyers this year already too.

Yet there are threads on here like "in at Rutgers" and "Seton Hall v. Hofstra" and other nonsense. WTF are these kids thinking?

I wouldn't be surprised if they start with 50 people and then expand the program each year much as the NJ AG's office did. As Robot pointed out, these types of savings are politically painless, since lawyers perform makework paper-churning and are essentially fungible/replaceable at the drop of a hat. These programs can just cycle a fresh set of kids thru the ranks each year, just as the clerkships do. It's not as if these jobs require much in the way of experience or ability: any clown can cut n' paste the laughable bales of nonsense we call "motions" and "briefs" together. It's not like Biglaw where the clients care about school & class rank: the taxpayers hate lawyers anyway and love reading about them getting screwed, so this is a win/win as they see it. Just read the comments to the NJ.com articles and see the glee people have at lawyers getting canned.

[sunynp]

Oh, looky here. Right on schedule. I told everyone dude was a troll on the other thread and took heat for it.

Is this the start of the new "JDU infiltration of TLS" plan? I saw the poster mention Seton Hall, every JDU'ers favorite school to bash. What do you guys call the dean, the oil can man or something like that?

A'nold, I think you are talking about me. I am not on JDU. As I said in my post, I mentioned Seton Hall because their career services officer was quoted in the article. After the discussion on information asymmetry I wanted to see what could be found from basic sources about the school. I linked every piece I quoted from except wikipedia which I think people could find if they are interested. I would have used any school that was quoted in the article, I think the article used Seton Hall because they are in NJ. I have no axe to grind against Seton Hall and I have no idea what is the name of their dean.

US attorney in NJ joins other offices in using volunteers
The above is the full article. The full article is linked to in this ABA journal post that areyouinsane quoted: http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/ ... _attorneys

And I did apologize if I was going off-topic. I think this is off-topic too, but I wanted to be sure people understood where the information was coming from.

[luthersloan]

If the federal government stop issuing/guaranteeing loans for law schools, and state governments enforced existing laws against false and misleading advertising this whole problem would likely sort itself out. Except for the people who have already been "had," there is not much to be done for them, aside from making loans dischargeable.

[beach_terror]

This is a really stupid question, but this is a really stupid thread so I'm going to ask anyway. Why don't we get some sort of tax alleviation while we have outstanding student loan debt? Paying back our loans would be a lot easier if they just dumped us in a low tax bracket and required us to spend the difference between tax brackets on our student loan debt. I guess the government can't compel us to spend our money a certain way, but it'd be a hell of an opt-in program - assuming I'm not missing something huge.

[A'nold]

If the federal government stop issuing/guaranteeing loans for law schools, and state governments enforced existing laws against false and misleading advertising this whole problem would likely sort itself out. Except for the people who have already been "had," there is not much to be done for them, aside from making loans dischargeable.

Wouldn't that alone basically take care of it in the long run?

[luthersloan]

Well, if make less then 80 or 90k a year, some of your student loan interest is tax deductable. However, given the bi-modal salary distribution you are likely either making to much to qualify, or not enough to make a real dent in your loans even with a deduction.

[luthersloan]

If the federal government stop issuing/guaranteeing loans for law schools, and state governments enforced existing laws against false and misleading advertising this whole problem would likely sort itself out. Except for the people who have already been "had," there is not much to be done for them, aside from making loans dischargeable.

Wouldn't that alone basically take care of it in the long run?

No, just making the loans dischargeable, while still issuing them without regard to their actual chances of being repaid, would cause the government to take a massive bath on said loans. I doubt tax payers are really interested in blowing billions funding a lot of unprofitable legal education.

[Verity]

If areyouinsane had any brains, he'd form a union for lawyers and paralegals, rip off the assets, and then flee to Turkey.

[beach_terror]

Well, if make less then 80 or 90k a year, some of your student loan interest is tax deductable. However, given the bi-modal salary distribution you are likely either making to much to qualify, or not enough to make a real dent in your loans even with a deduction.

Well fuck it, just exempt those who opt in for like 3-5 years and make them submit paperwork and make qualifying payments or they get kicked out of the program. I'm convinced there's a solution somewhere in giving people time to catch their breath before paying off the man.

[luthersloan]

He could be the Jimmy Hoffa of lawyers!

[areyouinsane]

Hiring a few interns does not equal filling their staffs with tons of unemployed people.

Here's another thing: these people are not "interns" in the traditional sense of the word. When I hear the word "intern" I think of a kid coming off freshmen year of college, maybe a J major fetching coffee for the beat writers at the NY Times or a theater student working as a grip at a Brodaway show unloading prop crates or changing light bulbs.

As the article stats, the NJ AG interns are fully licensed attorneys and graduates of law school, not students. And these so-called "interns" aren't fetching coffee or cite-checking briefs: they're taking depositions, appearing in court, and drafting documents independently. They are giving the state of NJ their professional services (and the means by which they should be earning a livelihood and getting ahead in life) for absolutely NOTHING. Zilch. Zero dollars.

What other "profession" has fully licensed professionals giving their individual services away for free? If a dentist goes into a prison to do a root canal, he gets paid. If an electrician puts up new lights on the NJ Turnpike, he gets paid. If a plumber puts new water-saving faucets in the Bergen County Courthouse, he gets paid.

That's because those professions' members wouldn't dream of doing anything for free, esp. for a corrupt toilet of a state like NJ. They are also members of professions where the supply/demand metrics are not so absurd as to compel one to work for free if one chooses to ply their trade.

Make no mistake, there's a sea change underway here and these "work for free" programs are going to catch-on big time unless some of these diploma mills (like every NJ/NYC Tier 2/3/4 schools) shut down.

I'm also not sold on the "experience" angle: if you were a hiring partner and interviewed a candidate who was apparently so desperate that they were/are working for free, what type of salary would you offer said person? Hell, a dollar a week would be a huge "raise" from what they're currently earning. IMO anyone entertaining the idea of applying for these programs should just face the hard truth and look for work outside of the legal profession. When you work for free, you've conceded that your skills aren't worth paying for and have a market value of 0 dollars. Treat the JD as a "sunk cost," as I have. Toss the diploma into the fireplace and, if all else fails, just head abroad and say bye-bye to Sallie Mae for good. This county's best days are behind it anyway. The current situation is the "new normal": high unemployment, low wages, and steadily declining standards of living. All the expansion and hiring going on in the corporate world is abroad, in Asia and other nations where labor is cheap and there isn't as much red tape (most of which is caused by lawyer-politicians LOL).