I won't mind long hours! I do 90 hours weeks during finals! Forum

[Clearly]

Might as well edit the thread title to "I won't mind long hours! I'll be getting 160k for them!"

I completely believe biglaw sucks, I really do... BUT I think some posters need a little perspective on careers in general. Swinging a hammer for 10 hours a day at $10 an hour, sucks. Not everyone was brought up with a middle class+ life, and plenty of people would trade lives with you. I'm not saying people with comfortable lives have nothing to complain about...I'm just saying they have some things to be grateful for too...

[SLS_AMG]

Re: I won't mind long hours! I do 90 hours weeks during finals!

I would love to watch you bitch about big law in person to people that don't have jobs and see how that goes over.

[MKC]

Might as well edit the thread title to "I won't mind long hours! I'll be getting 160k for them!"

I completely believe biglaw sucks, I really do... BUT I think some posters need a little perspective on careers in general. Swinging a hammer for 10 hours a day at $10 an hour, sucks. Not everyone was brought up with a middle class+ life, and plenty of people would trade lives with you. I'm not saying people with comfortable lives have nothing to complain about...I'm just saying they have some things to be grateful for too...

LIES

Building shit is fun. The pay is shit, you can't do it when you're old, and the weather sucks sometimes, but framing houses is some of the coolest shit I ever did, and it comes with instant gratification. Oh, and you get to eat whatever you want because you burn 10,000 calories a day, all while being in better shape than anyone you know.

[Danger Zone]

Nowadays the only workout that Merkin gets is lifting himself by his bootstraps.

[MKC]

Re: I won't mind long hours! I do 90 hours weeks during finals!

I would love to watch you bitch about big law in person to people that don't have jobs and see how that goes over.

This thread might interest you for the diverse perspectives.

[MKC]

Nowadays the only workout that Merkin gets is lifting himself by his bootstraps.

[84651846190]

It's 12:16 AM. Still working...

[rad lulz]

I can't fall asleep so I'm workin

[IAFG]

Re: I won't mind long hours! I do 90 hours weeks during finals!

I would love to watch you bitch about big law in person to people that don't have jobs and see how that goes over.

Pls role play what you think would happen tyia

[monsterman]

I think these threads are hilarious, but they're also really helpful. Why wouldn't an 0L want a transparent take on what it actually means to work in a firm?

[Ricky-Bobby]

Might as well edit the thread title to "I won't mind long hours! I'll be getting 160k for them!"

I completely believe biglaw sucks, I really do... BUT I think some posters need a little perspective on careers in general. Swinging a hammer for 10 hours a day at $10 an hour, sucks. Not everyone was brought up with a middle class+ life, and plenty of people would trade lives with you. I'm not saying people with comfortable lives have nothing to complain about...I'm just saying they have some things to be grateful for too...

LIES

Building shit is fun. The pay is shit, you can't do it when you're old, and the weather sucks sometimes, but framing houses is some of the coolest shit I ever did, and it comes with instant gratification. Oh, and you get to eat whatever you want because you burn 10,000 calories a day, all while being in better shape than anyone you know.

I don't know, I got fat as a cable guy because I ate drive-thru food every day and refused to get the ladder off of the truck.

Pay was definitely shit, though.

[sandiego222]

Might as well edit the thread title to "I won't mind long hours! I'll be getting 160k for them!"

I completely believe biglaw sucks, I really do... BUT I think some posters need a little perspective on careers in general. Swinging a hammer for 10 hours a day at $10 an hour, sucks. Not everyone was brought up with a middle class+ life, and plenty of people would trade lives with you. I'm not saying people with comfortable lives have nothing to complain about...I'm just saying they have some things to be grateful for too...

The people who constantly whine about working long hours in a 6 figure job are the same ones who dedicate 90% of their energy in law school to complaining about how hard and stressful law school is. There are a ton of those people, so it shouldn't shock anyone that the same attitude is commonplace at big law firms.

[IAFG]

The people who constantly whine about working long hours in a 6 figure job are the same ones who dedicate 90% of their energy in law school to complaining about how hard and stressful law school is

The two biggest biglaw whiners I know:
1) loved every second of law school, huge law geek
2) never complained about LS at all, instead bragged about not going to class/studying

i'm sure you're not just totally talking out of your ass tho

[sandiego222]

The people who constantly whine about working long hours in a 6 figure job are the same ones who dedicate 90% of their energy in law school to complaining about how hard and stressful law school is

The two biggest biglaw whiners I know:
1) loved every second of law school, huge law geek
2) never complained about LS at all, instead bragged about not going to class/studying

i'm sure you're not just totally talking out of your ass tho

Whoa

My point is that the people in law school are an outrageously, disproportionally, whiny bunch. I believe you that the hours are a harsh adjustment for other people, such as those who slacked off throughout law school. But there's no reason to think that the people who are constant stress balls WOULDN'T be complaining in a job with very demanding hours.

On a side note, good luck to anyone finding an entry level job that pays 6 figures and gives you significantly better hours than a law firm. Unless you work for yourself.

[bk1]

I believe you that the hours are a harsh adjustment for other people, such as those who slacked off throughout law school.

Wait, are you implying that biglaw isn't a harsh adjustment for people who don't slack off during law school?

[sandiego222]

I believe you that the hours are a harsh adjustment for other people, such as those who slacked off throughout law school.

Wait, are you implying that biglaw isn't a harsh adjustment for people who don't slack off during law school?

No? Not sure how you deduced that, but if it came across that way, I didn't mean it to.

My point is that the level of complaining seems to be a bit off the charts. There was a culture of 'our hours suck' in my experience in a different field with comparable hours (think PE, banking, consulting), but not quite the doom and gloom/ depression that comes through in threads like this

[Otunga]

I like these threads. They seem to address the justifications I've (and seemingly others) come up with for biglaw. The "but it's 160k!" justification is probably the main one, like it automatically offsets the negative aspects of biglaw. A related theory that comes up is "Small law seems to require similarly bullshit hours and psychotic partners, so why not go for the bigger salary?". Of course, you could just not go to law school.

[MarshallE]

On a side note, good luck to anyone finding an entry level job that pays 6 figures and gives you significantly better hours than a law firm. Unless you work for yourself.

I do think this point tends to be dismissed a little too readily on TLS. For all the biglawyers out there, I ask this sincerely: what did you anticipate the workload to be like, given the immense financial opportunities provided by Biglaw? There are very few fields that offer the type of starting salary biglaw does, and even fewer that offer the growth potential that comes with advancing through the associate structure into partnership. Even if you aren't successful on that path, you are still being given the opportunity to compete for some of the best paying jobs in the nation, an opportunity which the vast majority of people go their entire lives without having. If you are a non-entrapaneur and want to enter a field where you can be making 6 figures in your mid 20's and potentially 7 figures by your 30's, its going to come with an intense and stressful work environment. That is a universal quality in well paying jobs. It just leaves me scratching my head when I hear people complaining about the stress associated with making immense amonuts of money. If you go k-jd, you will be making 3 times the median U.S. household income by the time you're 25. If you're in sticker debt and paying 30k back a year, you're still making nearly 2.5 times the median income in your first year of work. It is a remarkably privileged assumption to make that one should be afforded a job with that level of financial success, as well as moderate hours and fulfilling work. So seeing how unhappy many of your biglawyers seem to be, do think you overvalued the financial incentives prior to taking the Biglaw dive?

[mirroroferised7]

there are like 15 things that are awful about biglaw. Some of them might not bother you, but at least one will.

YUP

Well, if you're bored and taking requests, can we get a list of the 15 awful things about biglaw?

[IAFG]

On a side note, good luck to anyone finding an entry level job that pays 6 figures and gives you significantly better hours than a law firm. Unless you work for yourself.

I do think this point tends to be dismissed a little too readily on TLS. For all the biglawyers out there, I ask this sincerely: what did you anticipate the workload to be like, given the immense financial opportunities provided by Biglaw?

I will just have to keep repeating myself: it's not the hours. It's not the hours. Okay, sometimes it's the hours, but as DF said, there are like 12 things that make biglaw untolerable to some people. The likelihood that one or more of those things will apply to you too is very high.

There are very few fields that offer the type of starting salary biglaw does, and even fewer that offer the growth potential that comes with advancing through the associate structure into partnership.

LOL partnership prospects. LOLOLOL.

Even if you aren't successful on that path, you are still being given the opportunity to compete for some of the best paying jobs in the nation, an opportunity which the vast majority of people go their entire lives without having.

Wait what

It just leaves me scratching my head when I hear people complaining about the stress associated with making immense amonuts of money. If you go k-jd, you will be making 3 times the median U.S. household income by the time you're 25. If you're in sticker debt and paying 30k back a year, you're still making nearly 2.5 times the median income in your first year of work. It is a remarkably privileged assumption to make that one should be afforded a job with that level of financial success, as well as moderate hours and fulfilling work. So seeing how unhappy many of your biglawyers seem to be, do think you overvalued the financial incentives prior to taking the Biglaw dive?

Maybe you should scratch your head less and try to listen more about why people hate it.

I absolutely overvalued the financial incentives in that I thought I would care about making a lot of money. I find meetings where the firm tries to explain comp/bonus structure incredibly boring because I don't care about making more money, at all.

[cotiger]

I love the tendency of the 0Ls who push back in these threads to assume that the attorneys on here somehow didn't consider these really basic arguments back when they were thinking about going to law school/aiming for biglaw.

It's not like the difficult work environment of biglaw has been a big secret until just now. They knew it required grueling hours going into, and (assumedly) they too thought that it wouldn't be too big of a deal in exchange for the high paycheck. It ended up being significantly worse than they expected.

[worldtraveler]

That's just because you have ovaries and don't understand money.

[rpupkin]

The people who constantly whine about working long hours in a 6 figure job are the same ones who dedicate 90% of their energy in law school to complaining about how hard and stressful law school is.

In my experience, it's not the same people. It's almost the opposite: the people who hated law school (but nevertheless managed to pull decent grades and get big law) don't seem to mind the big law environment as much. I think those of us who loved law school suffer (and complain) more in big law.

[A. Nony Mouse]

ITT 0Ls who have never worked in biglaw make arguments about why it can't be that bad and biglaw associates are whiners that NO ONE HAS EVER MADE BEFORE.

[Danger Zone]

ITT 0Ls who have never worked in biglaw make arguments about why it can't be that bad and biglaw associates are whiners that NO ONE HAS EVER MADE BEFORE.

You just can't stop complaining, can ya?