Life as a unicorn Forum

[MidwestLifer]

So since every Yale student has a COA of greater than 100k, Yale isn't worth it for anyone?

What a fucking dumb thread

Kids with parent$$$$$$$?

[vinnnyvincenzo]

As someone who's worked 40 hours/week, there is no way in hell I would work 60, let alone the occasional 80. Ideally, this job is with a big law firm the OP hopes to one day join.

good luck getting anywhere in any career refusing to work shit hours.

Have you worked 40 hours for more than 6 months straight, let alone over 60.

Yes I have. Have you?

[politibro44]

As someone who's worked 40 hours/week, there is no way in hell I would work 60, let alone the occasional 80. Ideally, this job is with a big law firm the OP hopes to one day join.

good luck getting anywhere in any career refusing to work shit hours.

Have you worked 40 hours for more than 6 months straight, let alone over 60.

Yes I have. Have you?

[twenty]

First off, on the "what about rich parents?"

I truly doubt there are too many people applying to law schools that are in situations where tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars is actually chump change. If a kid truly is going to have all his worldly needs taken care of (i.e, a house, a nice car, etc.) and is not in a situation where the parents can either give him/her tuition OR a large down payment on a first house, then hey, go for it. But I think in a lot of situations, "my parents are paying for a lot of it" means the parents have to take a second out on their home, leave the kid substantially less money when they die, etc. I'll agree with you all that it definitely takes the sting out of six-digit debt, though.

150k is still a lot of debt. Even in biglaw that will probably take at least a half decade to pay back.

I fully agree, and I wouldn't advocate anyone take out 150k debt -- but I think a lot of TLS would still advocate (even ITE) that a 75k-ish scholarship at a T14 school is a solid way to go. So those are the people I'm more or less targeting with my OP.

Can't really blame TLS for only now just coming around to life in biglaw considering it is only just now that a significant TLS cohort has spent a bit of time in biglaw.

At the risk of sounding like a suck-up, this is where you and company that continue to come back to TLS are seriously one of the most valuable resources on this website. Looking through the 2008~ archives, it's pretty readily apparent that the people that came back did so to push for their law school because of "its outstanding faculty." So having people around that can actually answer questions as to the day to day life of a given profession is really helpful.

I feel you about keeping debt manageable, but that's quite some statement.

It seems a little extreme considering that sticker COA at a lot of schools is now north of 300k, but I think the law school hopeful community has lost sight of just how much this is. 300k is ridiculous, but frankly, so is 100k. Even when you're spending 100k on a law degree, you better be damn sure it's going to drastically improve your earning potential, because 100k is a ton of money -- and I don't think that can ever really be ignored.

Clerking is nothing like being on law review - some of the skills you need for LR/get through being on LR are relevant, but that doesn't make clerking like being on LR. In clerking you work on real cases, not on some law prof's pontifications about the influence of Bulgarian literature on the development of the Constitution or what have you. And I think that clerking is actually very related to the actual practice of law, with one caveat - as long as you're going into litigation. It doesn't teach you how to practice directly , but it teaches you stuff that's relevant to practice, and I'm much better as a practitioner having clerked first. (It's not the only way to get that knowledge, but that's not the point.)

I think there may be some confusion here, because it sounds like we're in complete agreement. Here's why I bring up law review: A prospective student "wants biglaw, and hopefully a federal clerkship." This person has no idea why they want a federal clerkship, just that it's apparently hard to get (and therefore prestigious) and everyone on TLS seems to think they're pretty great. I don't disagree with either of those things, but I think it's time we ought to treat 0L infatuations with federal clerkships on an equal level to (as if they were saying) "I really want to do law review" because to the vast majority of 0Ls, it is literally no different outside of collective familiarity.

It also does seem like (and this is only from my perspective) that 0Ls that emphatically want to clerk are, perhaps subjectively, seeking a job that is prestigious and doesn't actually involve the "actual" practice of law. This really isn't my primary point, because there's a lot of assumptions riding on this, but I think it's something to at least consider when a prospective law student uses clerkship as a hugely weighted factor in decision making.

I'm pretty sure they are really saying: I want a particular group of people to think I'm awesome. [...] This profession will not make you cool; at least not cooler than any of the people you will interact with on a regular basis.

I think that's one of the fundamental problems (hehheh) with people that can't actually articulate why they want to be attorneys -- they're not imaginative enough to realize a career where all their friends think they're awesome without having "Esq." or my personal favorite "Dr." attached to their names. But then again, you clearly realize that that's one of those legitimacy gap factors that causes law graduates to be so unhappy.

That all said, I agree with DF, and I don't think this addresses the fact that people are still making really bad choices based on clerkship goals (as opposed to less bad/costly decisions elsewhere?)

I think something like 60-80% of the entering 1Ls at top schools come into law school wanting to "do PI" (I've seen this multiple times. I realize my post would be more persuasive if I had a source.) Most probably only have a vague idea of what they want to do, but they have ambition, they're generally smart, and they've been on a certain path their entire lives. Law school seems like a way for them to fulfill their potential.

The guy you're talking about said something like "every day I spend at the firm takes me farther from my goals*." A lot of the people quoted in the "where are they now" Harvard article said similar things. My impression is that the people who come into law school with vague ideas of using their intelligence to make the world a better place while still having a sufficiently prestigious job title are the ones who end up the most miserable, because they invariably will feel like they failed to accomplish their true goals.

I like your advocacy, but I would add one more item to the list: If you think you want to "do PI" but a) have never held a full-time job in the field and b) cannot point to a SPECIFIC PI job that REQUIRES a JD that you want and you know you can get if you do reasonably well (median) at school x, do not go to law school. Period. End stop.

I could not agree more, and the only thing more frustrating than a person trying to decide if they should enslave themselves to 5-6 year's worth of debt for biglaw are the people trying to decide if they should enslave themselves to 10 (minimum) years of debt for PI, particularly when they have absolutely no experience with it. Now, I have been at fault any number of times for foolishly advocating that "sticker debt doesn't matter" if you want PI -- which is true on the humongous condition that, by nature of wanting a specific and articulated type of PI position, the person knows what they're getting into enough to justify 10 years of debt hanging over their heads.

The longer I'm on TLS, the less I believe in this. It's the minority of posters (though I would include myself in this number) that can clearly articulate a specific PI/government position they will be gunning for in law school, what exactly that entails, and how much money they should take out in order to get that position (hint: usually not as much as they think).

The point was that if for instance you get $120k to UChi + $15k savings + $20k/yr from fam, that's only $45k in debt. COA is $120k (well over twenty's limit), but it's tough for me to conceive of that as a bad position.

I should probably have been more specific in my OP in that I'm assuming that a "COA" figure is entirely financed by debt. I know my parents won't be paying anything for my law school, and I highly doubt that even folks with 3-4 years of work experience have enough built up in savings to mitigate substantial tuition costs.

Even then, I refer back to my earlier point where I say just because you can pay for something doesn't mean you should, but the whole point of OP is how being trapped in unicorn biglaw seems suckish, so yeah, another story for another day.

good luck getting anywhere in any career refusing to work shit hours.

See, I used to not feel bad for people with biglaw + lots of debt from a T14 because hey, they knew what they were getting into, plus starbucks alternative, blah blah blah. But the difference is, if you come to a point where you're like, "Hey, my life sucks, I want to be a professional banjo player in Louisiana" you uniquely cannot do that from biglaw + debt whereas you can from IB/consulting/otherhighhourjobs because you can walk away from those any time you want.

So since every Yale student has a COA of greater than 100k, Yale isn't worth it for anyone?

If I had a close friend who was looking at Yale and didn't really know what law as a career looked like, I would avidly attempt to dissuade that person from attending Yale, yes. People will get mad because OMFG ITS YALE, but the fact that you got into the best law school in the country should have no bearing on the guarantee of astronomically-high sticker debt combined with a disinterest/misunderstanding of what law as a career actually looked like.

Look, you're trying to box me into a ridiculous argument. I think Yale is a great law school, but at the point where a V5 associate is diagnostically depressed, suffering from medical issues relating to time spent in biglaw, can't really quit and would have less debt than your average Yale grad, even the "unicornish jobs" you get from having a Yale transcript don't really seem all that appealing when you consider the cost.

[bk1]

People may agree with you, but the clerkship/LR analogy is really inapposite. Nobody picks a school just so they have a higher chance of ending up on law review, but some people pick a school so they have a better shot at clerking.

I fully agree, and I wouldn't advocate anyone take out 150k debt -- but I think a lot of TLS would still advocate (even ITE) that a 75k-ish scholarship at a T14 school is a solid way to go. So those are the people I'm more or less targeting with my OP.

I dunno. PAYE reduces a lot of the risk of larger debt. It may not be a ticket to a house in the burbs, but life in a 50k job on PAYE wouldn't be the end of the world. To be fair, I haven't started paying loans back (woohoo 6 months from now) nor am I a lawyer yet (which I might find horrible) so maybe I'll be singing a different tune a few years from now. We'll see, but at least for now I'm not sure what I would recommend people be willing to take out for a T14 school or whether people are justified in wanting to be a lawyer.

[beepboopbeep]

have u read --LinkRemoved--?

That's a pretty fantastic post. Love the graphics.

I like your advocacy, but I would add one more item to the list: If you think you want to "do PI" but a) have never held a full-time job in the field and b) cannot point to a SPECIFIC PI job that REQUIRES a JD that you want and you know you can get if you do reasonably well (median) at school x, do not go to law school. Period. End stop.

I'd agree with this, but no way is it 60-80% who want PI. In my class there is an overwhelming majority gunning for biglaw (maybe it's different at UMich/Berk/etc) and a significant portion of that majority don't seem to have much of a grasp on how bad it is. Not that I really do outside of secondhand TLS wisdom, of course. Just saying that the above applies equally to non-PI folks. Also, "specific PI job that requires a JD that you know you can get if you hit median at school x" probably doesn't exist. Shit is mad competitive.

Overall, not sure what this thread is advocating other than, "debt is bad and people need to be realistic about law careers." Pretty edgy.

[TheSpanishMain]

So since every Yale student has a COA of greater than 100k, Yale isn't worth it for anyone?

What a fucking dumb thread

Not ANYone. Kids with rich parents, people with outside scholarship/funding (veterans with the GI Bill) or people who are dead set on some low-paying PI/government job and thus will be covered by Yale's loan repayment program. Other than that, no, Yale is not worth it IMO. If you're just a generic "Yeah, I'll do BigLaw" type, then you're going to be in the same job as the guy who went to CCN with money, except you'll be in way more debt.

[IAFG]

There is a lot in this thread that I disagree with, but I will flip the fuck out if V5 is added to our definition of "unicorn job." No. No. No. Unicorn jobs are not shitty kill yourself to help the rich steal from the rich at a large corporate law firm gigs that you can land from top 1/3 at t14s.

[Cicero76]

There is a lot in this thread that I disagree with, but I will flip the fuck out if V5 is added to our definition of "unicorn job." No. No. No. Unicorn jobs are not shitty kill yourself to help the rich steal from the rich at a large corporate law firm gigs that you can land from top 1/3 at t14s.

Agreed.

Also, I want to clerk, my COA is over 100k, I'm going to Yale without rich parents, and I like Suits.

Screw all* you guys. I'm going home.


*Except DF he's kinda cool I guess

[wons]

IAFG is spot on. A V5 job isn't a unicorn; it's basically available to anyone at Y, above median at H and S, and top third at CCN. That's, what, 700 people or so? It's a perfectly reasonable goal if you can get into those schools.

Also, you found someone that hates their firm job. Congrats! There are lots of those. There are also lots of folks who like them, and lots of folks who find them merely OK. The overarching principle is that anyone going to work in a 60-70 hour a week job has to be aware of the downside case of not liking the job, because that's a lot of time doing something that you may not have interest in.

And that's why law school is always a calculated risk. Especially if you take out a lot of debt to go. Calculated risk != never go. It just means be informed and cognizant of the potential upside case (making a ton of money to do something you like) and downside case (spending 70 hours a week locked in an office doing something you hate).

[UnicornHunter]

have u read --LinkRemoved--?

That's a pretty fantastic post. Love the graphics.

I like your advocacy, but I would add one more item to the list: If you think you want to "do PI" but a) have never held a full-time job in the field and b) cannot point to a SPECIFIC PI job that REQUIRES a JD that you want and you know you can get if you do reasonably well (median) at school x, do not go to law school. Period. End stop.

I'd agree with this, but no way is it 60-80% who want PI. In my class there is an overwhelming majority gunning for biglaw (maybe it's different at UMich/Berk/etc) and a significant portion of that majority don't seem to have much of a grasp on how bad it is. Not that I really do outside of secondhand TLS wisdom, of course. Just saying that the above applies equally to non-PI folks. Also, "specific PI job that requires a JD that you know you can get if you hit median at school x" probably doesn't exist. Shit is mad competitive.

Overall, not sure what this thread is advocating other than, "debt is bad and people need to be realistic about law careers." Pretty edgy.

ABOUT 80 PERCENT of incoming Harvard Law School students express a desire to practice public-interest law. After graduation, fewer than 5 percent work in that sector. This despite the school's offer to forgive the loans of students who take lower-income jobs.

I was basing the 60-80% number off of a very outdated article (http://www.esquire.com/features/killing ... rvard-0800). Looking back at it, the author does not provide any source for the number, and it is convenient to the point he is trying to make, so it could very well be an exaggeration. I vaguely recall Scott Turrow saying something similar in 1L.

[jk148706]

.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Also, where are we getting the idea that OP in the V5 thread was "borderline suicidal" and clinically depressed?

I read the thread and he/ she says several times that he/ she is a pretty happy person. OP just says the work sucks. Is anyone surprised biglaw work sucks?

I don't know if I'd say suicidal or clinically depressed, but the OP had a lot of complaints about life and didn't sound happy to me at all. He pushed back against the depression suggestion, but I think that's because whatever depression (or similar) is situational, caused by the job. He may in fact be absolutely contented as soon as he gets out of that job, but right now it still sucks.

(Twenty, re: law review & clerking, I was especially responding to your idea that clerking and law review are the same kind of masturbatory academic bullshit as law review, which I still don't think is true at all. I don't mean that by clerking you're going to change the world, they're just really different. I will give you that clerking often sounds appealing because it's a nerdy kind of job focused on research and writing, and I think it's a little easier for 0Ls who've excelled academically their whole lives to say, "that. I want to do that." I actually think clerking is a job that 0Ls can understand - if they do a little research they can have a pretty accurate idea of what it entails. A lot of it is still driven by prestige, and they still shouldn't pay any extra money for the chance to clerk, but I guess I don't see saying "I want to clerk" as a huge problem among 0Ls, when you come down to it.)

[Pragmatic Gun]

Is Yale sticker worth it to have a chance at becoming a SCOTUS clerk?

[IAFG]

Twenty, re: law review & clerking, I was especially responding to your idea that clerking and law review are the same kind of masturbatory academic bullshit as law review, which I still don't think is true at all. I don't mean that by clerking you're going to change the world, they're just really different. I will give you that clerking often sounds appealing because it's a nerdy kind of job focused on research and writing, and I think it's a little easier for 0Ls who've excelled academically their whole lives to say, "that. I want to do that." I actually think clerking is a job that 0Ls can understand - if they do a little research they can have a pretty accurate idea of what it entails. A lot of it is still driven by prestige, and they still shouldn't pay any extra money for the chance to clerk, but I guess I don't see saying "I want to clerk" as a huge problem among 0Ls, when you come down to it.

1) That's like arguing with someone who says tomato varietals are all the same. Only a real connoisseur of academic bullshit is going to say they're "really different."

2) It's a huge problem to orient your life around the end goal of a one year gig, if that's what people end up doing.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Twenty, re: law review & clerking, I was especially responding to your idea that clerking and law review are the same kind of masturbatory academic bullshit as law review, which I still don't think is true at all. I don't mean that by clerking you're going to change the world, they're just really different. I will give you that clerking often sounds appealing because it's a nerdy kind of job focused on research and writing, and I think it's a little easier for 0Ls who've excelled academically their whole lives to say, "that. I want to do that." I actually think clerking is a job that 0Ls can understand - if they do a little research they can have a pretty accurate idea of what it entails. A lot of it is still driven by prestige, and they still shouldn't pay any extra money for the chance to clerk, but I guess I don't see saying "I want to clerk" as a huge problem among 0Ls, when you come down to it.

1) That's like arguing with someone who says tomato varietals are all the same. Only a real connoisseur of academic bullshit is going to say they're "really different."

2) It's a huge problem to orient your life around the end goal of a one year gig, if that's what people end up doing.

I agree with #2. I don't agree with #1. But I didn't clerk for highfalutin COA types, so I'll exclude them. District court clerking is often pretty mundane - you're not even pretending to make new law, you're just applying law to the facts of the case before you. It's very practical and not academic at all. And you work what actual lawyers produce when going to trial (MSJs as far as the eye can see...)

[bjsesq]

Is Yale sticker worth it to have a chance at becoming a SCOTUS clerk?

Try to define how big that "chance" is.

[IAFG]

District court clerking is often pretty mundane - you're not even pretending to make new law, you're just applying law to the facts of the case before you. It's very practical and not academic at all. And you work what actual lawyers produce when going to trial (MSJs as far as the eye can see...)

Okay. Legal practice is WAY more mundane and less academic than that.

[09042014]

Is Yale sticker worth it to have a chance at becoming a SCOTUS clerk?

Try to define how big that "chance" is.

3.7% by my count. Scotus bonus is 300k. It's worth 11 thousand dollars.

[wons]

Is Yale sticker worth it to have a chance at becoming a SCOTUS clerk?

The litigators in here may have a more fulsome view, since my knowledge is only second hand from colleagues, but it is extremely hard to become a litigation partner at a Biglaw firm if you come up wholly within the system - b/c of the structural factors that prevent you from getting the experience you need. As a result, the folks with the best chance to make partner tend to either leave for government for a few years or come in from government in the first instance. Those jobs are very hard to get, and the better your clerkship, the better the chance of getting the kinds of jobs that make a partnership in litigation a non-unicorn possibility.

Which is a roundabout way of saying - Yale for the SCOTUS clerk maybe no, but Yale for the SCOTUS + other prestigous clerkships? I think so. Those clerkships pay off handsomely down the road.

[A. Nony Mouse]

District court clerking is often pretty mundane - you're not even pretending to make new law, you're just applying law to the facts of the case before you. It's very practical and not academic at all. And you work what actual lawyers produce when going to trial (MSJs as far as the eye can see...)

Okay. Legal practice is WAY more mundane and less academic than that.

Eh. Depends what you do. I'm in district court a lot. It's a lot of the same kind of mundane, just from the other side. Also, just because clerking is different from (various kinds of) practice doesn't make it the same as law review. I guess if you get a judge who thinks everything they do makes new law and is a SCOTUS-wannabe, maybe.

[IAFG]

District court clerking is often pretty mundane - you're not even pretending to make new law, you're just applying law to the facts of the case before you. It's very practical and not academic at all. And you work what actual lawyers produce when going to trial (MSJs as far as the eye can see...)

Okay. Legal practice is WAY more mundane and less academic than that.

Eh. Depends what you do. I'm in district court a lot. It's a lot of the same kind of mundane, just from the other side. Also, just because clerking is different from (various kinds of) practice doesn't make it the same as law review.

But Dist Ct clerking is a lot more like law review than 75% doc review, or 80% just swapping out entities and dates in form motions, or like, any corp work

[worldtraveler]

Can somebody give me a tldr of the OP?

[twenty]

There is a lot in this thread that I disagree with, but I will flip the fuck out if V5 is added to our definition of "unicorn job." No. No. No. Unicorn jobs are not shitty kill yourself to help the rich steal from the rich at a large corporate law firm gigs that you can land from top 1/3 at t14s.

A V5 job isn't a unicorn; it's basically available to anyone at Y, above median at H and S, and top third at CCN. That's, what, 700 people or so? It's a perfectly reasonable goal if you can get into those schools.

Considering the very essence of what is a unicorn job, I'm not prepared to dictate some hard and fast definition that would either include or exclude a V5 firm. But look, when we're talking about fractions of people at HYSCCN, I think it's reasonable to at least give credence to the fact that these people probably chose the V5 firm for the exit options and that those exit options will, presumably be "better" than the exit options from a different firm. If you two insist that a V5 gig isn't "unicorny" enough, fine, I'm not going to fight with you -- just keep in mind that at the point where students at the top six schools in the country would be ecstatic to land one of these gigs, that should at least give anyone who's looking at this thinking this is (one of) the best law school outcomes a moment of pause.

Also, you found someone that hates their firm job. Congrats! There are lots of those. There are also lots of folks who like them, and lots of folks who find them merely OK. The overarching principle is that anyone going to work in a 60-70 hour a week job has to be aware of the downside case of not liking the job, because that's a lot of time doing something that you may not have interest in.

Except that:

1) People in biglaw seem to universally hate it, with the exceptions being "I'm okay with it." People voluntarily leaving biglaw for a significant pay cut is pretty normal.
2) 0Ls have no business committing themselves to working in biglaw for 4-5 years (by taking out a lot of debt) when they've never actually worked at all, let a uniquely "mundane, yet stressful" environment.
3) Calculated risk really shouldn't apply to a world where the impacts are terminalized. I appreciate people make risky choices all the time, but it's basically law students and med students that take on six-digits of debt for the guarantee of (if nothing else) 7-13 years of having debt hanging over you and impacting your career choices.

A lot of it is still driven by prestige, and they still shouldn't pay any extra money for the chance to clerk

This was basically all I was going for. That, and that people looking at choosing between schools should probably be questioned a bit further when their primary goal out of law school is a clerkship.

[rayiner]

When I was a 0L, I too thought that people were just being GYPSY's when they complained about legal practice. And now that I'm a couple of years out of law school, I wish I could go back and smack my 0L self. There are a lot of GYPSY's in law school, to be fair. Those peoples' souls are crushed early on, though, like 1L or 2L year. I was cynical enough where the zero-sum nature of law school didn't bother me. And, coming from a job where I had worked 80 hour weeks on numerous occasions, I thought I could handle to work too. And at the end of the day, I can handle the work, it just takes a lot more out of me than I expected, even as cynical as I was going into the whole thing.

There's a difference between working hard and working like an immigrant laborer. Working for often awful people who in most cases care only about money, and in a job where you realize at every step that you're an easily replaceable cog. There's a 100 more "unicorns" right behind you ready to replace you when you burn out. Every year. Even if you don't personally burn out, the attrition gets to you. It's bizarre to be in an office of 500-600 lawyers where a third of the people joined in the last two years. Every time a mid-level or senior sends a departure e-mail, you wonder "did they get a decent exit?" And when you see a junior or mid-level leave, you wonder "geez, I hope they have something lined up."

Yeah, it's probably better than the treatment you get as a retail employee or whatever. At least you're treated like a grown-up and not fired for being five minutes late and nobody is watching to see how long you spend on lunch breaks. That's what America has become, and at least as big lawyers we're insulated from that, so I guess we should be thankful for that. But it's not as far removed from the chicken-fight that's the rest of the economy as I think even the most cynical among us expected it to be, given all the education and debt involved.