Will lower enrollment rates improve legal employment? Forum

[resilience99]

If the lower enrollment rates continue, will employment get better? Is this flawed reasoning?

30 year low in applications this year should allow for less competition for the class of 2016 for jobs.

[wisdom]

I don't think so initially. Enrollment is falling by a lower rate than the apps are, schools are just dipping deeper into the applicant pool/accepting people with lower numbers. For now. If it really becomes a crisis -- if apps drop to 40k a year or something -- then we may see schools really starting to die off (at the bottom fringes) or drastically cut class sizes. This process is going to take a while.

[09042014]

If the lower enrollment rates continue, will employment get better? Is this flawed reasoning?

30 year low in applications this year should allow for less competition for the class of 2016 for jobs.

Well lower enrollment is only sort of related to applications. Schools can and do lower standards. Lower enrollment will help. But only so much. Half of all students aren't really getting law jobs as it is. You'd need enrollment to fall by a large percent to see good outcomes for most students.

[resilience99]

I don't think so initially. Enrollment is falling by a lower rate than the apps are, schools are just dipping deeper into the applicant pool/accepting people with lower numbers. For now. If it really becomes a crisis -- if apps drop to 40k a year or something -- then we may see schools really starting to die off (at the bottom fringes) or drastically cut class sizes. This process is going to take a while.

there is an estimate of 38,000 matriculating http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/educa ... .html?_r=1&

[rad lulz]

If the lower enrollment rates continue, will employment get better? Is this flawed reasoning?

30 year low in applications this year should allow for less competition for the class of 2016 for jobs.

Well lower enrollment is only sort of related to applications. Schools can and do lower standards. Lower enrollment will help. But only so much. Half of all students aren't really getting law jobs as it is. You'd need enrollment to fall by a large percent to see good outcomes for most students.

Basically this

With like 25,000 jobs, not all of which are good, and 44,000 enrolees (rough numbers), a bunch of people are still gonna get shitjobs or nojob

[09042014]

If the lower enrollment rates continue, will employment get better? Is this flawed reasoning?

30 year low in applications this year should allow for less competition for the class of 2016 for jobs.

Well lower enrollment is only sort of related to applications. Schools can and do lower standards. Lower enrollment will help. But only so much. Half of all students aren't really getting law jobs as it is. You'd need enrollment to fall by a large percent to see good outcomes for most students.

Basically this

With like 25,000 jobs, not all of which are good, and 44,000 enrolees (rough numbers), a bunch of people are still gonna get shitjobs or nojob

IIRC that 25k jobs thing was pre ITE right?

[resilience99]

If the lower enrollment rates continue, will employment get better? Is this flawed reasoning?

30 year low in applications this year should allow for less competition for the class of 2016 for jobs.

Well lower enrollment is only sort of related to applications. Schools can and do lower standards. Lower enrollment will help. But only so much. Half of all students aren't really getting law jobs as it is. You'd need enrollment to fall by a large percent to see good outcomes for most students.

Basically this

With like 25,000 jobs, not all of which are good, and 44,000 enrolees (rough numbers), a bunch of people are still gonna get shitjobs or nojob

The estimate enrollees is 38,000. Assuming 35,000 actually graduate, thats a whole lot less competition. Also this is assuming that the job market will not improve naturally.

[rad lulz]

If the lower enrollment rates continue, will employment get better? Is this flawed reasoning?

30 year low in applications this year should allow for less competition for the class of 2016 for jobs.

Well lower enrollment is only sort of related to applications. Schools can and do lower standards. Lower enrollment will help. But only so much. Half of all students aren't really getting law jobs as it is. You'd need enrollment to fall by a large percent to see good outcomes for most students.

Basically this

With like 25,000 jobs, not all of which are good, and 44,000 enrolees (rough numbers), a bunch of people are still gonna get shitjobs or nojob

The estimate enrollees is 38,000. Assuming 35,000 actually graduate, thats a whole lot less competition. Also this is assuming that the job market will not improve naturally.

Link? I just pulled the 2011-2012 cycle

35k is still plenty of people getting shitjobs or nojob

[resilience99]

The estimate enrollees is 38,000. Assuming 35,000 actually graduate, thats a whole lot less competition. Also this is assuming that the job market will not improve naturally.[/quote]
Link? I just pulled the 2011-2012 cycle

35k is still plenty of people getting shitjobs or nojob[/quote]

I am talking about the estimated enrollment in 2013 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/educa ... .html?_r=1&

[Emma.]

Even if enrollment rates continue to fall and the economy improves, that doesn't mean that the legal job market will improve.

Many law firms are trying to cut back on their labor costs by increasing their use of contract attorneys, e-discovery tools, using software to draft basic agreements instead of 1st and 2nd years etc. This is probably going to result in less attorney positions even as the economy improves.

[Betharl]

I was planning on making a detailed post about this with statistics/projections at some point. Basically, yeah, employment outcomes should improve by a decent margin across the board.

[09042014]

I was planning on making a detailed post about this with statistics/projections at some point. Basically, yeah, employment outcomes should improve by a decent margin across the board.

Most law jobs are pure shit.

Only in the last two years was getting A JOB considered a victory. It's not.

[AllTheLawz]

Definitely flawed reasoning. Lower enrollment rates don't "improve" legal employment. Legal employment is not dependent on enrollment.

[resilience99]

Definitely flawed reasoning. Lower enrollment rates don't "improve" legal employment. Legal employment is not dependent on enrollment.

Less graduates competing for jobs.

[rad lulz]

Definitely flawed reasoning. Lower enrollment rates don't "improve" legal employment. Legal employment is not dependent on enrollment.

Less graduates competing for jobs.

If you paid $100k+ for some crappy job, does it really matter?

[SFSpartan]

Definitely flawed reasoning. Lower enrollment rates don't "improve" legal employment. Legal employment is not dependent on enrollment.

Less graduates competing for jobs.

This might be true in a a vacuum, or in fairytale land, but the real world is neither of these things. While lower enrollment means less graduates competing for jobs, there is still a large pool of unemployed attorneys from past graduating classes. Thus, a small difference in the size of one year's graduating class is unlikely to significantly mitigate the employment issues that graduates will face three years down the road.

[NoodleyOne]

Definitely flawed reasoning. Lower enrollment rates don't "improve" legal employment. Legal employment is not dependent on enrollment.

Less graduates competing for jobs.

This might be true in a a vacuum, or in fairytale land, but the real world is neither of these things. While lower enrollment means less graduates competing for jobs, there is still a large pool of unemployed attorneys from past graduating classes. Thus, a small difference in the size of one year's graduating class is unlikely to significantly mitigate the employment issues that graduates will face three years down the road.

Eh, I don't think this is correct. Many who missed out have likely moved on to other fields. Also, legal hiring largely takes place directly from law school, which gives students an advantage that people that are out of school don't have. Also, if someone has been out of legal employment for years and is still looking, there is likely a significant gap in their resume which will further hurt their chances.

It should help. How much is hard to tell.

[JDndMSW]

What about if YOUR school in particular has pretty dramatically lowered their enrollment numbers over the past few years? As long as you are looking in their major market wouldn't it be safe to assume it will help? Obviously not a ton but better than maybe this current graduating class that has 80ish more students?

[Ruxin1]

What about if YOUR school in particular has pretty dramatically lowered their enrollment numbers over the past few years? As long as you are looking in their major market wouldn't it be safe to assume it will help? Obviously not a ton but better than maybe this current graduating class that has 80ish more students?

I doubt it will change the grades places are looking for.

[thelawyler]

What about if YOUR school in particular has pretty dramatically lowered their enrollment numbers over the past few years? As long as you are looking in their major market wouldn't it be safe to assume it will help? Obviously not a ton but better than maybe this current graduating class that has 80ish more students?

I doubt it will change the grades places are looking for.

That is true for grades at most schools and most top firms, but most big law places are willing to take students at the mushy median of T14 schools; but due to economy/supply of student, some T14 schools have still had a hard time placing their medianish student. But the 10% decrease in class sizes across many T1 schools might open up 2-3 more spots for the top schools where grades matter less. Of course, this minor change will hardly be felt in any anecdotal way, and may just be a statistical blip of about 3% which is like impossible to really feel.

Example: a T1/T2 school with 250 per class decreases to 220 student. That means 30 less students, of which 3 would have been top 10%. That means 3 less students for medianish students at T14 schools to compete with for Big Law jobs. Of course, this applies across the board, so 3 x 40 schools that drop 10% would be 120 more spots? Totally random numbers, but the general principle holds.

tldr: not much affect for bottom, but might see slight blip at the top, but not enough to be noticeable in a tangible way.

[Aberzombie1892]

Employers have cut offs at each school that are based on either GPA or rank. The number of students graduating do not affect those numbers. A decrease in enrollment would lead to employers hiring more from either (1) schools that don't rank or (2) lower ranked schools (i.e. top 10% at T3, and top 5% at T4).

[thelawyler]

Employers have cut offs at each school that are based on either GPA or rank. The number of students graduating do not affect those numbers. A decrease in enrollment would lead to employers hiring more from either (1) schools that don't rank or (2) lower ranked schools (i.e. top 10% at T3, and top 5% at T4).

The cut offs are harder for the top firms, but mushier for the lower down big firms (for top schools) - and comes down to interviewing a lot for the top schools. History has shown that firms would rather have medianish students from prestigious schools than digging deeper into other lower schools. None of us have proof and you're welcome to disagree. But the fact that back in 2007 schools like NYU and CLS had 93-95% offer rates during OCI is evidence that firms were willing to dig deeper into top schools (for the prefstige) but still maintained grade cut offs for lower schools (as even then, nowhere near 40% of lower schools were placing into Big Law)

[NoodleyOne]

Employers have cut offs at each school that are based on either GPA or rank. The number of students graduating do not affect those numbers. A decrease in enrollment would lead to employers hiring more from either (1) schools that don't rank or (2) lower ranked schools (i.e. top 10% at T3, and top 5% at T4).

Source? Hell, anecdote to support this, even? Why would they dig deeper at schools where they probably don't go to for OCI instead of schools where they traditionally take numerous SAs from?

[JDndMSW]

My school has gone from 203 in 2010 in 155 this past years class and I have heard our class will likely be about 10 or so smaller (I believe they said this to us at ASW). I am not looking for biglaw so I guess this doesn't apply to me the same way.

[Aberzombie1892]

Employers have cut offs at each school that are based on either GPA or rank. The number of students graduating do not affect those numbers. A decrease in enrollment would lead to employers hiring more from either (1) schools that don't rank or (2) lower ranked schools (i.e. top 10% at T3, and top 5% at T4).

The cut offs are harder for the top firms, but mushier for the lower down big firms (for top schools) - and comes down to interviewing a lot for the top schools. History has shown that firms would rather have medianish students from prestigious schools than digging deeper into other lower schools. None of us have proof and you're welcome to disagree. But the fact that back in 2007 schools like NYU and CLS had 93-95% offer rates during OCI is evidence that firms were willing to dig deeper into top schools (for the prefstige) but still maintained grade cut offs for lower schools (as even then, nowhere near 40% of lower schools were placing into Big Law)

We aren't disagreeing. When I said schools that don't rank, I was referring to T18 schools that don't rank their students. Almost every other school ranks at least 10-33% of their class.

While in hindsight I see how that may have been confusing in abstract (schools that don't rank - their students vs. schools that don't rank - US News), I felt like the context of the discussion would have made that fairly clear.