Top Law Schools

I was under the impression that litigation always has worse exit options than transactional (fewer in house positions, not easy to get a govt job, not as easy to lateral). This interview (http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/ ... =most_read) indicates that five years ago transactional people were in a much worse position than litigators:

"Litigation, which is usually a constant, is down a bit, and that’s because I think during the recession, a lot of companies found that it was just so expensive to litigate that they now will settle or do all kinds of other things not to have to file. So there’s always litigation ongoing, don’t get me wrong, but it’s just not as hot as it has been."

"Other areas—I mean, I wish I had a crystal ball. I knew when we were in the recession, and they were laying off all of the transactional real estate and corporate lawyers, that in five years, we were going to be looking for them and they don’t exist, and that’s what’s going on right now. So that’s part of the cyclical nature of what’s going on, and I’ve been through this now through a number of these cycles."

I would appreciate thoughts on this. I'm a 1st year associate and I think a lot of us choosing a practice area are concerned about what life will look like if we are shown the door.

Kind of a weird question. Do you want to litigate for the rest of your career? If so, then from that perspective you've got better options than the corporate side. You can go to a firm of any size that suits you and do what you enjoy for the rest of your career. M&A/cap markets don't really have that option.

.

Hutz_and_Goodman wrote:I was under the impression that litigation always has worse exit options than transactional (fewer in house positions, not easy to get a govt job, not as easy to lateral). This interview (http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/ ... =most_read) indicates that five years ago transactional people were in a much worse position than litigators:

"Litigation, which is usually a constant, is down a bit, and that’s because I think during the recession, a lot of companies found that it was just so expensive to litigate that they now will settle or do all kinds of other things not to have to file. So there’s always litigation ongoing, don’t get me wrong, but it’s just not as hot as it has been."

"Other areas—I mean, I wish I had a crystal ball. I knew when we were in the recession, and they were laying off all of the transactional real estate and corporate lawyers, that in five years, we were going to be looking for them and they don’t exist, and that’s what’s going on right now. So that’s part of the cyclical nature of what’s going on, and I’ve been through this now through a number of these cycles."

I would appreciate thoughts on this. I'm a 1st year associate and I think a lot of us choosing a practice area are concerned about what life will look like if we are shown the door.

Litigation can slow down too (edit: Ok, I re-read and see this is saying litigation is down a bit NOW, and yeah, I've seen that).

So I kinda disagree with the assessment that litigation slows during recession. In my view (I was an SA summer 2009, and recession hit the fan summer 2008), recessions mean MORE litigation - business budgets get tight, suppliers and whatnot are going belly up, businesses know they have to go out and grab every possible penny they are owed and people are more likely to stop being able to pay bills so you gotta collect before they go bankrupt, etc. Meanwhile corporate goes down because you don't have mergers and shit happening, and bankruptcy goes up for obvious reasons. But in good times, companies are more willing to bite it when they get stiffed on a contract, or more willing to pay a settlement and move on because business is good and its not worth the time / expense, so litigation goes down - like now.

So this is just for background. Maybe litigation is "recession proof," but it sure as hell isn't "good time proof" if that makes sense. So I disagree with the premise that litigation is "usually a constant." Not anymore.