Class of 2012 Employment Statistics (new LST Score Reports) Forum

[Tiago Splitter]

Do you guys think this is a slight upward trend or just a minor fluctuation? Enough data to reasonably argue that c/o 2016 will have more job stability?

It is a slight upward trend and I don't expect it to get much better in the near future in terms of raw numbers. Over the past 5 years the total number of legal jobs has been relatively consistent, usually a bit below 30k. A significant problem has simply been too many graduates. It is very likely that there will still be too many graduates for the class of 2016. However, the percentages will be better because an estimated 14000 seats will have been eliminated since the class of 2012 enrolled in 2009.

But this shouldn't be enough to allay your fears. The other significant problem is that law school just costs too much money, and costs continue to rise despite wage depression for those who do get jobs.

Hey Kyle, do you know the historic background on biglaw wages? (How long have they been at $160,000? What was the average amount before that, and when did that change?) With inflation constantly going on, it just seems weird that tuition, cost of living, and pretty much everything else is going up while starting salaries seem to be set in stone.

http://www.nalp.org/new_associate_sal_oct2011

BigLaw went to 160K in 2007. Until Gunderson Dettmer raised to 125K in 1999 BigLaw paid under 100K.

[20141023]

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[Tiago Splitter]

Thanks for that, Tiago. Is there any chance in hell that it will go up again, or has it pretty much plateaued off for the foreseeable future? Or, looking at that link, could it actually go down from here?

No way to know for sure, but my guess is bonuses would start rising first.

[thomasyin2]

Holy fuck SMU?

[SportsFan]

Thanks for that, Tiago. Is there any chance in hell that it will go up again, or has it pretty much plateaued off for the foreseeable future? Or, looking at that link, could it actually go down from here?

No way to know for sure, but my guess is bonuses would start rising first.

"NYC to 190!" was a thing before the recession but never actually happened. No idea if/when salaries will rise again, and I don't even want to guess because I really have no idea.

[Tiago Splitter]

Thanks for that, Tiago. Is there any chance in hell that it will go up again, or has it pretty much plateaued off for the foreseeable future? Or, looking at that link, could it actually go down from here?

No way to know for sure, but my guess is bonuses would start rising first.

"NYC to 190!" was a thing before the recession but never actually happened. No idea if/when salaries will rise again, and I don't even want to guess because I really have no idea.

I would like to guess. I would like to guess that they rise before OCI.

[jenesaislaw]

Agree with Tiago that it's difficult to predict. It would shock me, though, in the near term. 160k isn't even NYC market anymore I don't think.

Add to this that it's becoming more and more popular to have two classes of junior attorneys and law firms seem to be run a bit smarter now than in the past, it's even more unlikely. Not my area of expertise, though.

Also, I remember "NYC to 190!" meme well. Many in my prospective student class thought it might happen.

[20141023]

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[thomasyin2]

what impact would it have on the big law statistic when last year's data counted firms with 50+ attorneys as "big law" whereas this year the numbers only include 100+ attorneys as big law?

I think for the new data, all Texas schools are having a good time, maybe because the states economy is recovering and simply doing better than most, if not vast majority of the other states. Am I right?

[Gunnar Stahl]

this is the best thread ever

[rad lulz]

this is the best thread ever

ALL HAIL LST

[Tiago Splitter]

Agree with Tiago that it's difficult to predict. It would shock me, though, in the near term. 160k isn't even NYC market anymore I don't think.

Wait... did you mean "wouldn't shock you"? (It's just that I don't usually hear the phrase "it would shock me," whereas I often hear "it wouldn't shock me.")

Also, what exactly do you mean by "160k isn't even NYC market anymore"?

I think he means it would shock him to see salaries rise in the near term.

Market in NYC is still 160K. In 2011 the median large firm first year got 145K, but that just means slightly less than 50% of first years at big firms ended up at firms paying 160K. This past year that number went back up to 160K. It's not as if all the firms went down to 145 and then back to 160.

A few firms did cut salaries, and I know at least Bryan Cave started using a model where they drastically cut required first year hours while also cutting salaries for that first year. But none of the big names in New York want to be the first to cut. On the other side, it would seem to only make sense to raise salaries if you can keep everyone else from following.

[jenesaislaw]

Agree with Tiago that it's difficult to predict. It would shock me, though, in the near term. 160k isn't even NYC market anymore I don't think.

Wait... did you mean "wouldn't shock you"? (It's just that I don't usually hear the phrase "it would shock me," whereas I often hear "it wouldn't shock me.")

Also, what exactly do you mean by "160k isn't even NYC market anymore"?

It would shock me to to see firms go above 160k. As for NYC market, it seems that there are fewer firms these days paying 160k than there were just a few years ago. Perhaps 160k is still "market" but it seems to be a more fractured one.

ETA: the term "market" has always been an interesting, imprecise one.

[PM2353]

Do you guys think this is a slight upward trend or just a minor fluctuation? Enough data to reasonably argue that c/o 2016 will have more job stability?

It is a slight upward trend and I don't expect it to get much better in the near future in terms of raw numbers. Over the past 5 years the total number of legal jobs has been relatively consistent, usually a bit below 30k. A significant problem has simply been too many graduates. It is very likely that there will still be too many graduates for the class of 2016. However, the percentages will be better because an estimated 14000 seats will have been eliminated since the class of 2012 enrolled in 2009.

But this shouldn't be enough to allay your fears. The other significant problem is that law school just costs too much money, and costs continue to rise despite wage depression for those who do get jobs.

Thanks for answering. Whether I decide to go into Law or not, LST is so awesome. Really impressed by everything.

[Faconnable]

I went ahead and edited my post in the first page to include this, but in addition to LST, there was a spreadsheet based on the 2011 data that I thought was useful, so I went ahead and did the same thing for the 2012 data as well:

2012 Employment Graphs

Thank you very much!

[09042014]

If I were making graphs, and I'm way too lazy. I'd include.

Law firms 101+
Gov.
Fed Clerkships

Gov jobs are a hot commodity right now. Definitely a good outcome.

I wish the ABA broke down business better. It's hard to tell people who are JD/MBA -> consulting or banking vs. I work at walmart.

[20141023]

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[rad lulz]

FT/LT/BPR govt is a good outcome. Govt jobs are insanely competitive.

Agree w DF

[DoveBodyWash]

tag

[Tiago Splitter]

If I were making graphs, and I'm way too lazy. I'd include.

Law firms 101+
Gov.
Fed Clerkships

Gov jobs are a hot commodity right now. Definitely a good outcome.

I wish the ABA broke down business better. It's hard to tell people who are JD/MBA -> consulting or banking vs. I work at walmart.

A lot of government jobs are school funded.

The NALP report breaks down pay by type of work, so that helps with figuring out which business jobs are worth a damn, but it's still limited by the percentage of survey responses.

[Robespierre]

Do you guys think this is a slight upward trend or just a minor fluctuation? Enough data to reasonably argue that c/o 2016 will have more job stability?

Look at Je ne sais' summary in the OP of this thread (which is invaluable) and compare it to the one he did last year. The percentage of people who graduated into un- or underemployment actually went up from 26.4 to 27.7. The percentage who graduated into real legal jobs did go up from 55.2 to 56.2, but that's not much, and in part is explained by school-funded jobs. There was no major increase in hiring.

HOWEVER:
(a) The percentages managed to stay pretty constant even though the graduating class of '12 was bigger than the class of '11, meaning that there was an increase in the raw number of jobs for new grads, and

(b) There was definitely an increase in Biglaw hiring (from 8.5% of the class to 12.2%), with the new jobs going overwhelmingly to grads of T30-ish schools. And I think Biglaw tends to be a "leading indicator."

So, a minor fluctuation with hint of potential for an upward trend.

[toothbrush]

thanks

[Nickg415]

A lot of people talk about how the unemployment rate you face coming out of law school is 55% but this take into account TTT schools and unaccredited schools that no one should attend. I thought it would be interesting to see employment rates dissagregated by tier/school rank. I broke up the schools into the most common groupings on TLS and looked at an estimate of the underemployment rank students graduating from a school in a certain group would face. Underemployment is simply unemployed + working part time. This is just an estimate in that the numbers represent an average of the underemployment rates, the actual underemployment rates will vary by 1 or 2 percent.

T10: 5.51%
T14: 7.75%
T25: 13.36%
T50: 19.00%
51-100: 28.69%
101-148: 31.002 %

Looking at this those from the T10 schools are doing better in terms of employment than the national average. This can probably be said for T14 and possibly T25 once we only look at unemployment. This isn't looking at the question regarding the ridiculous cost of attendance which must be considering when looking at whether or not these students are better of than the national average. Once you look at the lower T50 and up things get drastically worst.

Eventually I want to spend some time and get the actual underemployment rates and then compare them with the previous years. It can then be said whether or not employment prospects are improving for higher ranked schools while getting worst for lower rank schools.

[Kurst]

If I were making graphs, and I'm way too lazy. I'd include.

Law firms 101+
Gov.
Fed Clerkships

Gov jobs are a hot commodity right now. Definitely a good outcome.

I wish the ABA broke down business better. It's hard to tell people who are JD/MBA -> consulting or banking vs. I work at walmart.

FT/LT/BPR govt is a good outcome. Govt jobs are insanely competitive.

Agree w DF

Government positions (even those classified as full-time, long-term) are not necessarily good outcomes. Consider this graph:



If nearly 80 recent Cooley grads secured preftigious government jobs, Cooley may indeed be the #2 school in the country. If you look at the percentage of grads with Government/FT/LT jobs instead of the raw number, the picture is still confusing:



Just as it is impossible to distinguish a Business/FT/LT investment banker from a Business/FT/LT Walmart associate, it is impossible to distinguish a Government/FT/LT attorney at a federal agency from a Government/FT/LT school-funded fellowship.

[Greyhound42]

I could be reading that graph incorrectly, but in that first one I think you're mistaking raw numbers for percentages.