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I know there's tax. And it depends on firm and the market... but other than tax, what practice areas seem to offer the best work life balance down the road? I think this is something I should be thinking about now rather than later, and I thought a message board might elicit more honest replies than the recruitment process!

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If work life balance is really, really important to you, more important than making six figures out of the box (or maybe ever), look into doing administrative law for a state or local government entity. Unless you join the local Public Defender, you will work essentially forty hours a week and have weekends and holidays off. Even the PD won't work you much harder than that.

But starting salaries run as low as the mid-$40s so be aware that a decent family life comes at a price.

What about if we change the question to "better"... corporate versus litigation even? Or within there? are there other specialized groups like tax that are worth considering?

Not NYC would help. Speaking of which, NYC deal oriented tax is likely as brutal as other practices.

Trusts and estates is a tiny but likely very life styly choice.

In general large law firms are not life style choices. The key is you become a highly paid service provider, and a lot of the value that you and your firm add comes from being available at the drop of a hat.

disco_barred wrote:Not NYC would help.

Well, fuck.

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Patent prosecution somewhere other than NY

wiseowl wrote:Patent prosecution somewhere other than NY

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Employee benefits is probably better than tax with respect to quality of life. This is especially true if you can get away from deal-related EB work.