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Hello TLS. How competitive are associate positions in international trade? If one we're at median at a t14, how likely would one be to get a position?

I know three people in international trade specifically, assuming you mean the practice in trade laws and dealing with government trade agencies/regs/courts.

One got in by networking into a clerkship at us court of international trade before getting biglaw. The other two were internationals that worked as lawyers at their home courtries’ international trade agency (office under something else? Don’t remember) before they came to us for JD. One of three was well below median while the other two were just above median. The networking guy also spoke two foreign languages, one at near native level.

Sorry not a direct answer but hope the data point helps. I think i

I practice international trade in one of the fed agencies. I can’t speak for how “competitive” it is but it’s a very niche field and you need to be very clear what the practice of international trade entails. If you think it’s about international business and cross border transactions where you get to fly round the globe closing deals, no that ain’t it. If you think it’s about unfairly priced (or alleged) imports and you help your client keep it out/in the country, that’s really the meat and potatoes of it. Of course then there’s the export side where you deal with export controls and sanctions, as well as related practices such as CFIUS and FCPA practices. The field is rather small and the trend is starting to become that big firms usually do respondent side (foreign imports) while small firms do petitioner side. Interesting fact, most of the political appointee trade officials in USTR and Commerce are former Skansen people. Especially for USTR, some lawyers in the field calls it essentially a branch office of Skadden.

Echoing the above, I went to a T2 and know two median students who were able to get into these groups in biglaw after clerkships at the Court of International Trade in NYC.