Ask a law student questions about things he's not qualified or interested to answer

[ace99]

Q: Should I go to.....?

A: No

Q: You didn't let me finish!

A: I knew what you were going to say. The answer is no. You should not. You can thank me later.

Q: Well maybe you can tell me why?

A:

(1) Debt is massive
(2) There are no jobs
(3) It's miserable

Q: Well I knew about the debt but I'll do really well on my LSAT and get a scholarship....

A: No you won't.

Q: Well how can there be no jobs? Surely there are some jobs?

A: Sure if you want to work in a basement reviewing documents for $12 an hours while trying to pay off $160,000 worth of student loans. Go for it.

Q: What about those big firm jobs that pay $160,000 starting salary?

A: Ever wonder why lawyers have the highest drug abuse, alcoholism and suicide rates of all professions? Yeah.

Also there are maybe five of those jobs left. You won't get it. After the Great Legal Bloodletting of 2008 there was massive layoffs of first year associates. Some of them are still unemployed. The legal job market still hasn't recovered. These days you're not getting those jobs unless you're top 20% from NYU or Columbia or what-not.

Q: Then why are you doing it?

A: Sunk cost fallacy. Also it makes my drinking socially acceptable.

Q: Suppose I want to go anyway?

(1) You're an idiot but:

a. Only go if you get into one of the T-14 schools or a strong affordable regional school that has reliable ties to the market.
b. You get a full scholarship.
c. Your daddy will get you a job after you graduate.

Unless you meet any one of those three conditions. Don't go.

 

[timtofly]

Should we abolish all laws and start from scratch?

 

[ace99]

Should we abolish all laws and start from scratch?

God forbid. Do you want to put me out of work?

 

[Arwon]

I don't not want that?

 

[Arwon]

Also can I clarify something here? Is there such a thing as undergraduate law taught at generalist universities in the United States? It seems from how Americans talk about it, that all law is taught as post-grad degrees at specific institutions?

Because I can think of nothing that would be less pleasant than having to be in an entire institution filled with nothing but law students.

 

[Zelig]

The LSAT looks fun and I think going to law school and annoying law students for a few years would be fun before I return to my current career, but with a law degree.

 

[ace99]

Also can I clarify something here? Is there such a thing as undergraduate law taught at generalist universities in the United States? It seems from how Americans talk about it, that all law is taught as post-grad degrees at specific institutions?

Because I can think of nothing that would be less pleasant than having to be in an entire institution filled with nothing but law students.

1. Not really. There is pre-law programs but they're jokes. Law schools are all post-grad.

Yes it is fairly unpleasant.

The LSAT looks fun and I think going to law school and annoying law students for a few years would be fun before I return to my current career, but with a law degree.

You live in Canada it's different. You have a reasonable legal job market because you have like 14 law school so you're not churning out 100,000 lawyers with only 40,000 jobs.

 

[LamaGT]

I ruled out law school as soon as I discovered that an unpaid 2 years stage was required after graduation (at least here in Italy)
You should probably emigrate to a country with a high demand of lawyers, I'm sure there's plenty of them.

 

[Zelig]

You live in Canada it's different. You have a reasonable legal job market because you have like 14 law school so you're not churning out 100,000 lawyers with only 40,000 jobs.

I'd probably go to the US for law school, I'm pretty sure I could crush the LSAT and it would be more fun to annoy US law students.

Also can I clarify something here? Is there such a thing as undergraduate law taught at generalist universities in the United States? It seems from how Americans talk about it, that all law is taught as post-grad degrees at specific institutions?

Because I can think of nothing that would be less pleasant than having to be in an entire institution filled with nothing but law students.

Law isn't a post-grad degree, it's a professional degree like engineering or medicine.

 

[ace99]

I ruled out law school as soon as I discovered that an unpaid 2 years stage was required after graduation (at least here in Italy)
You should probably emigrate to a country with a high demand of lawyers, I'm sure there's plenty of them.

It's not that easy. Each country has its own requirements and own laws. Often you would need to spend a year or two in a foreign law school or have some kind of quasi-apprenticeship with a local law firm or something along those lines before the local bar will allow you to practice. Local bars tend to be protective of their industry too, so they don't want foreign lawyers mucking about. China for instance doesn't allow it. And lets not forget the difference in the legal systems, the US is a fusion country with English common law (Louisiana is the freak-show which uses Code Napoleon).

I'd probably go to the US for law school, I'm pretty sure I could crush the LSAT and it would be more fun to annoy US law students.

Sure what are you basing that on? Your SAT? You ever taken a timed practice LSAT? What did you score? Everyone thinks they're a special snowflake who's going to ace the LSAT and be at the top 10% in law school. By its nature the top 10% is the top 10%. i.e. not you.

 

[Arwon]

Law isn't a post-grad degree, it's a professional degree like engineering or medicine.

I don't understand what that means.

 

[ace99]

You get a title. Esquire.

 

[emzie]

My brother majored in translation (which is apparently an actual major at Kent State??) and speaks Spanish and Japanese. He's going to work as a paralegal translating documents for lawyers. He expects he'll make more than many lawyers. Is he right?

 

[Zelig]

Sure what are you basing that on? Your SAT? You ever taken a timed practice LSAT? What did you score? Everyone thinks they're a special snowflake who's going to ace the LSAT and be at the top 10% in law school. By its nature the top 10% is the top 10%. i.e. not you.

Don't have the SAT in Canada, never done a practice LSAT.

I base my confidence on doing well in math competitions throughout my undergrad and finding formal logic classes to be laughably easy.

I realize it doesn't mean much without me actually doing the LSAT, but if I every feel like prioritizing it, I'll post back about my results.

I don't understand what that means.

A post-grad degree is a master's or phd, which builds on top of an undergraduate education. Professional degrees are generally not research-heavy and don't require an undergrad degree. If they do require an undergrad degree, it's just a filtering mechanism. (ie. Make law students have biology degrees so you can bin all the applicants without degrees vs. make biology phds have biology degrees so they know WTH is going on.)

You get a title. Esquire.

I've got a title, but pretty much anyone other than a medical doctor who uses one is a tool.

 

[ace99]

My brother majored in translation (which is apparently an actual major at Kent State??) and speaks Spanish and Japanese. He's going to work as a paralegal translating documents for lawyers. He expects he'll make more than many lawyers. Is he right?

Yes. Paralegal salaries can start at say $45,000 but I expect your brother is making much more because of his language skills probably $55,000 or $60,000 starting in a few years he'll probable be making quite a comfortable salary depending on the size of the firm he works for. An experienced paralegal is often many times more valuable than a newbie lawyer. You can't replace a paralegal. You can replace a lawyer.

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/16/the-toppling-of-top-tier-lawyer-jobs/

Few newly minted lawyers actually earn salaries close to the median (or mean) — their pay tends to fall much higher or lower. In other words, the salaries for have for years been “bimodal,” meaning they’ve generally sorted into two levels: the $160,000 earned by first-year associates at big, white-shoe law firms, and the $40,000-to-$65,000 range earned by lawyers at smaller law firms, government jobs and so on.

In 2009, 25 percent of new lawyers reported receiving starting salaries of $160,000. In 2010, that share fell to 18 percent, and then in 2011, to 14 percent

In 2009, salaries in the $40,000-to-$65,000 range collectively accounted for 42 percent of reported salaries; in 2010, 48 percent; and in 2011, 52 percent.

The growth in that left-side hump reflects not only fewer $160,000 jobs, but also the creation of new second-tier, nonpartner-track jobs.

Orrick, for example, hired a bunch of lawyers for new nonpartner-track jobs at its hub in West Virginia at salaries around $60,000. These lawyers perform a lot of the same kind of work that their $160,000 counterparts used to, but at lower cost to the firm (and to clients).

 

[arya126]

Hello, Im a junior in High school however my eventual goal would be to go to Law School (Obvious as isn't it since I'm posting in this thread....). I have a few questions that you may in fact be able to help me with.

One, from what I have seen in this thread you have been talking about private sector jobs, correct? I know that the stereotype of big salaries and such comes from private firms and I have indeed faced the same reality as you that that job market is shrinking and as that article said, they are increasing nonpartner associate positions. But what about government jobs, such as public defender and prosecutors?

Two, latching onto the answer of the above, is there any disparity in the amount of jobs based on field? I plan on (hopefully) going into the field of Criminal Law, so is the demand for jobs in that field significantly different that in Corporate or civil law for example?

Three, would you consider William and Mary and Widener University (Widener is just outside of Philadelphia, WM is in Virginia) to be good Law programs to enter into? Focus more on WM for this one; I believe Widener fits more into that regional school with ties to a local job market type of school you mentioned.

Four, could you give a breakdown of how a typical Law School curriculum advances and what sort of topics you broach as you advance? For example what do they start you off with, and what year (I believe it is third year) do you begin to have opportunities to take your experience to a real courtroom?

Five, what is a good judge for how well you will do on the LSAT? Would you recommend we begin studying for it casually years in advance, or is it something to focus on once it gets closer to the time you take it?

 

[Zelig]

Five, what is a good judge for how well you will do on the LSAT?

How good you are at formal logic.

Take more math.

 

[ace99]

One, from what I have seen in this thread you have been talking about private sector jobs, correct? I know that the stereotype of big salaries and such comes from private firms and I have indeed faced the same reality as you that that job market is shrinking and as that article said, they are increasing nonpartner associate positions. But what about government jobs, such as public defender and prosecutors?

Government jobs have grown more competitive. It's not a safe fall back since everyone had the same idea as you when the market crashed. "Oh let me go for a government job, it's safe, reliable and 40 hours a week with benefits."

Competition for public sector jobs has increased a lot. If you want to work for the District Attorney, the Public Defender, the Civil Rights Division, the Justice Department, the Attorney General etc... expect to get good grades and be at the top half of you class at the very least. When you're applying to state jobs use the alumni network, if your school is a solid regional school where everyone working in the AG's office graduated from Boston University or Boston College that will help.

Two, latching onto the answer of the above, is there any disparity in the amount of jobs based on field? I plan on (hopefully) going into the field of Criminal Law, so is the demand for jobs in that field significantly different that in Corporate or civil law for example?

With criminal law you're looking at either government or private defense firm. These really vary from state to state. My advice is to choose if you want to go the prosecutor route or the public defender route. Try not to dabble in both. What I've been told is that the PD's office doesn't like to take people who have worked for the DA's office. The DA is fine with taking PD's though. Lot more judges come from DA for what its worth.

Three, would you consider William and Mary and Widener University (Widener is just outside of Philadelphia, WM is in Virginia) to be good Law programs to enter into? Focus more on WM for this one; I believe Widener fits more into that regional school with ties to a local job market type of school you mentioned.

Widener is a tier 3 or tier 4 school. Don't go. Rankings matter.

William and Mary is tier 1 which is better, see if you can get a scholarship because I think its pricey. Your regional competition will be UVA, Georgetown, George Washington, UNC and American kids.

I think Ann Coulter or was it Bachmann graduated from William and Mary. If that matters.

Four, could you give a breakdown of how a typical Law School curriculum advances and what sort of topics you broach as you advance? For example what do they start you off with, and what year (I believe it is third year) do you begin to have opportunities to take your experience to a real courtroom?

You'll take some combination of the following divided between the first 2 semesters, they're required:

Property
Torts
Contracts
Criminal
Civil Procedure
Constitutional Law
Legal Research and Writing
Maybe Criminal Procedure

Don't expect any of them to teach you anything of practical use except LRW, Civ Pro and Crim Pro. LRW is what you will be doing for the rest of your career.

Courtroom will depend on where you take your 1L internship at. Work for a judge or legal aid and you'll likely see the inside of a courtroom a lot. Work for a firm or corporation, probably never. A PD or DA intern might go to court occasionally. There's certain rules about that the bar has. I think a law student can represent a client in admin law court when supervised by a attorney. Or something like that.

Five, what is a good judge for how well you will do on the LSAT? Would you recommend we begin studying for it casually years in advance, or is it something to focus on once it gets closer to the time you take it?

Take the LSAT cold, with no practice. Kaplan or Princeton Review offers free proctored tests now and then. Check at your local university. If you get say about a 150 without practicing at all, you should do decently if you can bump that grade up 15-20 points with study.

Get the Bibles. The Logic Games Bible and the Logical Reasoning Bible. Maybe a general review book.

Do lots and lots of practice tests for say 2 months leading up to the test.

You have time to worry about that later.

In the meantime build up your livers capacity, wouldn't want to be a lightweight.

 

[Camikaze]

white-shoe law firms

What is a white shoe law firm? Are there certain firms in which people exclusively wear white shoes? Is it some kind of hypnotic technique to bedazzle other parties?

I have not heard this term before.

I second Arwon's confusion. I assume the 'law' Zelig is referring to is a JD? I know the US has LLMs (because that's what people do when they go to study in the US), and that's a Masters.

 

[ace99]

What is a white shoe law firm? Are there certain firms in which people exclusively wear white shoes? Is it some kind of hypnotic technique to bedazzle other parties?

I have not heard this term before.

I second Arwon's confusion. I assume the 'law' Zelig is referring to is a JD? I know the US has LLMs (because that's what people do when they go to study in the US), and that's a Masters.

They're the big name old white man firms. Arnold & Porter, Sullivan & Cromwell, Cravath, Swaine & Moore, Latham & Watkins, White & Case etc....