What are all of these law school graduates going to do? Forum

[dc2013]

So, I have been looking around this website for a while now, and I see that nobody, including myself, has jobs. I go to a T20 in a very good legal market (if there is such a thing) and only about 1/3 of my class has a job lined up for after graduation. What are all of these law school graduates going to do? There is clearly not enough jobs to meet the demand.

I am curious if anyone has thoughts on this.

What I suggest is that we all short sell Sallie Mae then default on our loans.

[rad lulz]

Probably flee the country.

[Grazzhoppa]

rockstar or movie star

[kalvano]

I plan to move to St. Kitts and be a beachside bartender.

[NotMyRealName09]

I recently met a girl who now holds licenses for two states and is working at her grandpa's deli.

It's rough out there.

[Anonymous User]

I think it's time to admit that the universe doesn't care about us.

Damn.

[Anonymous User]

Nothing, but the law schools will continue to act like they all have six figure legal jobs.

[BeenDidThat]

So, I have been looking around this website for a while now, and I see that nobody, including myself, has jobs. I go to a T20 in a very good legal market (if there is such a thing) and only about 1/3 of my class has a job lined up for after graduation. What are all of these law school graduates going to do? There is clearly not enough jobs to meet the demand.

I am curious if anyone has thoughts on this.

What I suggest is that we all short sell Sallie Mae then default on our loans.

I can see why you are doing poorly in law school.

More than one person on this website has a job. More than 1/3 of your class has a job lined up after graduation. You don't understand subject-verb agreement. And you understand neither how credit works nor the problems inherent in coordinating collective action.

Good day.

[thelawyler]

So, I have been looking around this website for a while now, and I see that nobody, including myself, has jobs. I go to a T20 in a very good legal market (if there is such a thing) and only about 1/3 of my class has a job lined up for after graduation. What are all of these law school graduates going to do? There is clearly not enough jobs to meet the demand.

I am curious if anyone has thoughts on this.

What I suggest is that we all short sell Sallie Mae then default on our loans.

I can see why you are doing poorly in law school.

More than one person on this website has a job. More than 1/3 of your class has a job lined up after graduation. You don't understand subject-verb agreement. And you understand neither how credit works nor the problems inherent in coordinating collective action.

Good day.

Logic fail: even if OP did well, there'd still be tons of unemployed grads. Stop being a fucking asshole.

[BeenDidThat]

So, I have been looking around this website for a while now, and I see that nobody, including myself, has jobs. I go to a T20 in a very good legal market (if there is such a thing) and only about 1/3 of my class has a job lined up for after graduation. What are all of these law school graduates going to do? There is clearly not enough jobs to meet the demand.

I am curious if anyone has thoughts on this.

What I suggest is that we all short sell Sallie Mae then default on our loans.

I can see why you are doing poorly in law school.

More than one person on this website has a job. More than 1/3 of your class has a job lined up after graduation. You don't understand subject-verb agreement. And you understand neither how credit works nor the problems inherent in coordinating collective action.

Good day.

Logic fail: even if OP did well, there'd still be tons of unemployed grads. Stop being a fucking asshole.

That's not a logic fail, you fucking asshole. That's a straw man you constructed.

If OP wants to ask a question, that's cool. But the whole prefacing a question with a bunch of nonsense doesn't really make me feel like trying to help.

I hope your e-righteousness makes you feel warm inside.

[androstan]

So, I have been looking around this website for a while now, and I see that nobodymany people, including myselfexcluding myself, ha[ve] jobs. I go to a T20 in a very good legal market (if there is such a thing) and only aboutthe top 1/3 of my class has a job lined up for after graduation. What are all of these law school graduatesam I going to do? There isare clearly not enough jobs to meet the demand.

I am curious if anyone has thoughts on thiscan help me feel better about my difficult situation.

What I suggesthope is that we all short sell Sallie Mae then default on our loans.

[A. Nony Mouse]

FWIW: I went to a T1 in a fairly small market (not a T-14 or the like, but the top school in the market) and graduated 2011. I would say that top 1/3 with jobs lined up for after graduation was about correct. Within the year after graduation, though, I would say that almost everyone in my class is employed (the couple I know of who aren't don't seem to want to practice law). So it's not like not having a job lined up at graduation means you're going to be homeless in the gutter.

That said, I would say there's a fair amount of underemployment. I don't think there are a lot of people doing pure doc review, but that's partly because there's very little biglaw (as this board would define it) out here that needs those armies of reviewers. Some people are contract attorneys. A number are PDs/ADAs/working for the city/county (I should say I don't count that as underemployment, I'm just throwing it in for completeness). A lot of people seem to work for small firms where the pay isn't great but you still work a lot of hours. This group especially, they're doing real law work (if your mantra is biglaw or bust it would be beneath your notice, probably, but it's not doc review), and my school was relatively cheap, but I know some are struggling with the debt.

Like I said, this is a fairly small market (nice place to live, not a big legal market), and it's very much NOT NYC/DC/LA/Chicago, so I realize you can only extrapolate so far. But IMHO, the bigger problem is underemployment, not unemployment. (For my school. I don't know how people at the T2 in the area is faring.)

(Now, if when you say "there aren't enough jobs to meet the demand" you only mean biglaw, NYC-market-paying jobs, well, duh. That's always a gamble. I also agree that generally speaking, there are too many lawyers. But I thought this might add some perspective to how that can play out.)

[2LsAPlenty]

FWIW: I went to a T1 in a fairly small market (not a T-14 or the like, but the top school in the market) and graduated 2011. I would say that top 1/3 with jobs lined up for after graduation was about correct. Within the year after graduation, though, I would say that almost everyone in my class is employed (the couple I know of who aren't don't seem to want to practice law). So it's not like not having a job lined up at graduation means you're going to be homeless in the gutter.

That said, I would say there's a fair amount of underemployment. I don't think there are a lot of people doing pure doc review, but that's partly because there's very little biglaw (as this board would define it) out here that needs those armies of reviewers. Some people are contract attorneys. A number are PDs/ADAs/working for the city/county (I should say I don't count that as underemployment, I'm just throwing it in for completeness). A lot of people seem to work for small firms where the pay isn't great but you still work a lot of hours. This group especially, they're doing real law work (if your mantra is biglaw or bust it would be beneath your notice, probably, but it's not doc review), and my school was relatively cheap, but I know some are struggling with the debt.

Like I said, this is a fairly small market (nice place to live, not a big legal market), and it's very much NOT NYC/DC/LA/Chicago, so I realize you can only extrapolate so far. But IMHO, the bigger problem is underemployment, not unemployment. (For my school. I don't know how people at the T2 in the area is faring.)

(Now, if when you say "there aren't enough jobs to meet the demand" you only mean biglaw, NYC-market-paying jobs, well, duh. That's always a gamble. I also agree that generally speaking, there are too many lawyers. But I thought this might add some perspective to how that can play out.)

I would say the results for students at the T2 schools is much more dire. I have heard in interviews about how many candidates there are for the one or two positions available and that all or most are qualified. Given several on LR still have no jobs tells me it is still a very troubling market. As some have suggested, you have to hustle to try to beat the "odds".

[A. Nony Mouse]

FWIW: I went to a T1 in a fairly small market (not a T-14 or the like, but the top school in the market) and graduated 2011. I would say that top 1/3 with jobs lined up for after graduation was about correct. Within the year after graduation, though, I would say that almost everyone in my class is employed (the couple I know of who aren't don't seem to want to practice law). So it's not like not having a job lined up at graduation means you're going to be homeless in the gutter.

That said, I would say there's a fair amount of underemployment. I don't think there are a lot of people doing pure doc review, but that's partly because there's very little biglaw (as this board would define it) out here that needs those armies of reviewers. Some people are contract attorneys. A number are PDs/ADAs/working for the city/county (I should say I don't count that as underemployment, I'm just throwing it in for completeness). A lot of people seem to work for small firms where the pay isn't great but you still work a lot of hours. This group especially, they're doing real law work (if your mantra is biglaw or bust it would be beneath your notice, probably, but it's not doc review), and my school was relatively cheap, but I know some are struggling with the debt.

Like I said, this is a fairly small market (nice place to live, not a big legal market), and it's very much NOT NYC/DC/LA/Chicago, so I realize you can only extrapolate so far. But IMHO, the bigger problem is underemployment, not unemployment. (For my school. I don't know how people at the T2 in the area is faring.)

(Now, if when you say "there aren't enough jobs to meet the demand" you only mean biglaw, NYC-market-paying jobs, well, duh. That's always a gamble. I also agree that generally speaking, there are too many lawyers. But I thought this might add some perspective to how that can play out.)

I would say the results for students at the T2 schools is much more dire. I have heard in interviews about how many candidates there are for the one or two positions available and that all or most are qualified. Given several on LR still have no jobs tells me it is still a very troubling market. As some have suggested, you have to hustle to try to beat the "odds".

Yeah, that may totally be the case. (In my market traditionally the T2 students are much better at hustling than we are, actually, and have a lot of alumni connections - but it's a bigger school so the further down the class you are, it must get tough.) I do think it's a little hard to tell how a class is going to fall out this far out from graduation, since lots and lots of firms and local government don't hire months in advance. (Again, talking just employment. Whether it's a job you want/worth the investment is another question.) But as you go down the food chain it gets worse, no doubt.

[LSATNightmares]

A lot are going into policy now in DC. I left a policy analyst position to go to law school, and I was replaced by a Catholic University Law grad. I also noticed that all of the analyst positions were slowly being filled by recent law grads rather than policy people.

[2LsAPlenty]

Hope there are a lot of policy positions because the private firm positions are not going to be there for a very large number of the 3Ls.