LSAC and Predicting Applicants for 2016-17, Part 13

Isn't that far too many given the glutted attorney market? I just lost a gig that paid me $250.00 for each traffic matter I handled. I lost out to a far more desperate soul that agreed to do the same work for "well below $200.00." They will just hire one of the thousands and thousands of newbies at $15.00/Hr. that you guys pump out. That stunt does not give "access" to the underserved. It is potentially harmful and may subvert justice. What if the matter can not be resolved with one court appearance? Will the client be tossed under the bus in the name of money? Will clients be strong armed into a plea?

Come on. This shtick is getting really old. At a minimum, at least diversify — the legal market is comprised of many, many types of lawyers other than sole practitioners who handle traffic matters.

anon,

Agreed. However, 50% of the "legal market" are Solos. My point is that the market is so oversaturated, attorneys are desperately walking all over each other for any shred of work….we calling it tossing a bone. It maybe getting old to you, but thousands of us attorneys are stuck with what you call "shtick."

Maybe there's something wrong with YOU?! I suppose that's an impossible explanation for why the legal career of your dreams hasn't dropped into your lap?!

You are absolutely correct. There is something wrong with me. My Axis 1 Diagnosis is mild Intellectual Disability/Deficit functioning. Thank god I attended a therapeutic day law school that provided self-contained classrooms and was able to monitor my medication. If you want, I will be happy to tell you what psychotropic meds I am currently taking.

The shtick is so tiresome. Why don't you go outside and get some fresh air.

There is no basis to the oft repeated claim here that 50% of attorneys in the US are solo practitioners. If you can point to data showing this Capt. please enlighten us.

Please don't encourage him. It's all a shtick at our expense. It was humorous at first but now has gotten really tiresome.

Anon,

It's just a hair under 50 percent per the ABA.

http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/migrated/marketresearch/PublicDocuments/lawyer_demographics_2013.authcheckdam.pdf

Interesting, "our expense." I believe we are both victims of the ABA and its accreditation binge. If the legal profession absorbed, hired or had good middle class sustaining work for all of its entrants and veteran attorneys who desired it, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Unfortunately, schools are buying out professors and "right sizing." You guys are interdependent with us practitioners. The better we do (Solos, Big Law, gub'mint, etc) will attract the high quality student you need to maintain the School. Our outcome flows to you guys. Were in this together. Its not a shtick. Go to the local court house a pull a couple of Solos aside….ask them how much money they got from their client for that day's appearance.

I do not know whether the Cpatain is real or not, but I do believe that he is correct in that the vast majority of attorneys are solo or very small (<10) firm practitioners and I remember hearing this from a lexis or Westlaw rep years ago when they started offering plans to these attorneys. You may recall that these services were originally available to only large firms, corporate legal departments and law schools. The companies realized that there was a lot of money to make offering plans to solos and small firms since that is where most lawyers work.

Get outside major cities and most populous states and all you find are solos and very small firms. Lawyers in these states do work hand to mouth. Take a state like South Dakota, only 2,000 lawyers in the entire state. No real large firms, al solos are very small firms.

Leo: no data supports the assertion that half of all lawyers or more are solos. You (slyly? naively?) change the original assertion to include small firms which is not the issue. It's not the issue because BLS data tracks the income of all employed lawyers and that includes non-partners working for small firms. Hint: salaries and employment for lawyers including that group are up every year for two decades (except in 2008).

There are 1.2 mn licensed lawyers (ref: ABA). There are 600,000 "employed" lawyers (meaning not a partner or solo) (ref: BLS).

We simply do not know how many of the other 600,000 are retired, working as non-lawyers, partners or solos.

According to the ABA, as of 2005 75% of lawyers were in private practice, and 49% of those were solos. Another 14% were in firms of 2-5 lawyers.

http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/market_research/lawyer-demographics-tables-2015.authcheckdam.pdf

I marvel at how my posts garner provoke? such attention and thought on this blog. No even Mrs. Carswell devotes such attention to me, unless she wants me to walk the dog or wash the dishes.

ABA lawyer demographics survey from 2012 says 49 percent solo. That hasn't really changed over time. Just under half of all private sector lawyers fly solo.

Cpt Carswell's schtick is thus underrepresented, not over. We need more input from solos in this profession. We need more representation of them in law schools too.

We need more ordinary lawyers like them on the Supreme Court. They can't all be Frankfurters and Cardozos. (Couldn't resist, given your avatar, captain)

I love the way anon professors post about the legal profession authoritatively, while displaying a howling ignorance of its realities.

So yes, most lawyers are solos. But even when lawyers are in small-firms they are very often effectively solos sharing resources and office space, but ultimately in an eat-what-you kill, no-associates, all partners-sharing-overhead arrangement where they might as well be solos. Actually, a lot of solos operate out of that sort of arrangement too – they just don't have a "firm" name on the door.

Funny how anon at 03:00 PM at can naïvely say "You (slyly? naively?) change the original assertion to include small firms which is not the issue." Maybe anon should be given a test on his knowledge of the law as a business – pass-fail, tenure at stake? I mean, should a naïf about the practice of law be teaching those destined to practice law?

Is [M][@][c][K] the same person as Captain Hruska Carswell, Continuance King?

APL

No, brackets is not the Captain. Not even close.

The Captain is a pretext; one whom I have believed from the start is a law prof who is intentionally portraying practitioners as jack a..es – for obvious reasons here in the Lounge.

The data cited by Campos is more than a decade old but if the trend held it would mean about a third of all lawyers are solos, not a half.

Those in small firms are not at issue in this debate because incomes of employed lawyers has increased as have employment levels, steadily for many years.

Nope. Brackets is not me. You can tell by the patterned ICON that designates a new comment…All of my comments have a greenish sunburst pattern associated with my them since I started posting here. The reason I have so much "support" is that there are lot of attorneys like me who appear in court for a under 3 bills. I do what I do even though the check bounces sometimes. Plus, I try not to misrepresent things, even here. (See Prof. Lubet's posts on Ethnography) My world is populated by too many attorneys who are attempting to get a fee from people who REFUSE to pay for legal services. When they finally, reluctantly fork over the two bills, they expect us to waive our magic wands and make their problems disappear.

Is AnonPracticingLawyer a practicing lawyer…..?

I do not have the same sort of practice as the pseudonymous Captain has – very far from it. At the same time, it is very apparent that the vast majority of law professors have little or no idea of the realities of legal practice or how the economics of it plays out. That is probably understandable when you consider the career path of the typical [current] law professor (clerkship, maybe 1.6 years in BigLaw, or some vaguely administrative title in a Federal Agency, VAPing on the side….all the while on a salary.) No pressure to bring in clients, not pressure to make decisions (maybe write memos about them, but not make them), no associates, secretaries and overhead to pay – no worries about making your own pension arrangements, etc., income tax deducted at source, expenses paid upfront….

The majority of lawyers in legal practice are either solos, or in most practical respect solos (even if in small firms.) Not all work for $100 per hour, or $50, some can change $800+ per hour in the right practice area, but only a minority work in what might be called salaried roles, where they do not have to worry about bringing in paying clients, paying their costs, setting aside revenue for income tax, etc., making their own pension arrangements- which is what happens when you are essentially self employed. Outside of government, I do not know of practicing lawyers that enjoy even a modicum of the day-to-day economic security that tenured law professors have – and government lawyers have a much more stressful job with a much higher workload, while even in larger firms partners are under permanent pressure to produce business. I am not going to say that I do not earn more than the typical law professor (I do, which is also more than the typical lawyer) – but that income is extremely precarious and probably always will be – and it was a long struggle to get there.

The authoritative way so many "anon" law professors discuss legal practice, while simultaneously displaying obliviousness to and deep ignorance of its realities still continues to astonish me. I can understand that for most those realities are outside of their personal experience, but you'd think they'd try to learn about it? They are supposed to teaching lawyers to be lawyers….is understanding legal practice a type of "scholarship" they find repugnant.

Anon looks at ABA data that shows 30 plus years of approximately 48 percent solo lawyers and concludes, well "maybe a third." You, sir, are biased.

It may be shocking to your world view, but almost half of all lawyers are solos. That so few law faculty can even fathom that reveals the academy's dirty secret: those at the gate to the profession, who are charged with training the new entrants, know very little about the profession.

The high percentage of solos raise further problems. They're not in the wage data from BLS. That means, that the $113,000 average wage of employee lawyers is too high and not representative. The average wage for solos is much, much lower than $113,000. If you have $150k in student debt, it's also hard to cobble together the $25,000 that you need to start and carry a solo firm for the first year, when almost no be ensue comes in, but checks for fax machines file cabinets and computers go out.

It also poses a crisis in how newbiews are trained. The old saw from law schools is that we'll teach you to think like a lawyer and OTJ trading from your firm will teach you to practice. Many law grads never get to part 2 of that process. It's a recipe for malpractice.

I very much enjoyed aspects of law school, and found parts of it useful – even today. But it could be much better, much cheaper, and there should be way fewer law students. At 20,000 to 25,000 grads per year, there is little problem. If schools hold their standards and the bar exam stays in place, and the ABA doesn't repeal the LSAT, we'll probably get there.

Jojo

$25,000 to start and carry a solo firm for the first year??

You must be kidding – I'm trying to imagine a practice where you could do it for $75,000. Office space (required by many state bar's rules), insurance without a claims history, office equipment (computer, printer, fax – and realistically some sort of server, email and domain), someone to answer the phone, disbursements and expenses (assuming you don't have a retainer which can increase insurance costs), accountant, heat electricity, light PLUS your own living expenses until fees start coming in.

I don't disagree with your point, but $25k – sheesh- no way that's enough, not near. Maybe enough to cover one lawyer's overhead in a larger practice – just.

I know you are a lawyer JoJo but even the arithmetically challenged Campos makes it clear that far less than a half of licensed lawyers are solos. Now that data is more than a decade old but very hard to imagine – and you have no data to back it up – that the number is now a half.

And again if you read slowly you will note that incomes and jobs for lawyers employed by small firms are tracked by the BLS OES and those show a steady increase in jobs and incomes for lawyers over two decades.

You do not know the incomes for solos because they are not tracked. The closest we have to understanding that is the data provided by Simkovic and McIntyre which show a very significant lifetime earnings premium for JD holders.

MacK,

You can do it, but it ain't fun. That is bare bones, minimum, dog bite/traffic ticket/dui/wills/estates/divorces/walks in the door solo practice.

You need:
$1,200 for a computer and decent backup system
$800 for quality printer/fax/photocopier
$300 for lousy backup printer/photocopier
$1,000 per month for rent on an office share arrangement
$1,000 in office supplies
$1,000 in minor advertising (yellow pages, pennysaver, bar journal listings, etc.).

You answer your own phone.
You keep your own books.
You live at home with parents or with roommates anyway you can to keep living costs to $500 per month.

A lot of solos go bare on malpractice insurance at first.

You need the $25,000 nut for disbursements and cushion until you get some revenue (like $10,000) the first year. Expect $20,000 year 2. $40,000 year 3. $50,000 year 4 and 5. Then maybe — maybe — $65,000 to $80,000 in years 6 through 10+.

Not to change the subject, but I notice that there is a slight uptick in the total number of applicants from Mr. Brophy's previous (#12) post. It is still hard to know whether the number of applicants, at cycle's end, will be slightly up from, slightly down from or about the same as last year's number.

I have seen several posts regarding the increase in the amount of active recruiting being done by law schools in recent years as compared with, say, seven years ago (when there was I imagine very little of same, if any). I just want to share some personal experience in this regard – I recently completed just the basic registration with the LSAC, with an eye towards applying for the class that will matriculate in Fall 2017. I neither registered for the LSAT nor paid even the basic CAS registration fee (now $170, which registers an applicant for five years). I merely created an account, which consisted of my supplying some basic information such as my name, my email and street addresses, my veteran status (or lack thereof), my undergrad GPA range (choices were 3.00-3.25, 3.25-3.5, 3.5-3.75 and 3.75-4.0), and the level of my highest degree, which, in my case is a doctorate in chemistry (I'm a college chemistry prof). (I am planning to take the LSAT this coming fall.)

To my amazement, almost immediately I started getting emails from various law schools in quantity. Many were from lower-tier schools, but there were several emails and/or physical letters from Tier 1 schools, including six (depending on the rating system to which you adhere) Top 20 schools. Almost all of these promised a waiver of the application fee and automatic scholarship consideration. All this happened WITH MY HAVING NO LSAT SCORE ON FILE with the CAS. I received so many emails from law schools that I actually created a new folder in which to store all of them. There are now ~50 emails in that folder, from law schools literally all over the country – and I submitted my basic registration only about two months ago.

So, if you're having trouble wrapping your mind around why there are so many people applying this late in the cycle, it's that the schools are really pushing potential applicants to apply, and to apply now …

And before anyone asks, I am under no illusions that going to law school will necessarily be a path to a large income. I am simply interested in studying law because I believe that practicing law is something I would enjoy.

Jojo,

Tight, very tight – and you'd be one slow paying or non paying client away from catastrophe the whole time – and slow paying clients and back-end discounters are so very common, and disbursements have to be paid, vendors don't care about slow paying clients…

So many lawyers in small practices discover after the fact that their client intended them to work for free….

What about a car, cab fares (for lot of meeting and hearings public transport is impractical), all the charges that people think wealthy lawyers can just pick up…

Dr. Goodwin,

Thanks for providing us with information that has not been covered at all (or barely) in the law school scam wars. Sounds like we have a lot of recruiters out there that very much don't want to win the set of steak knives or worse at their place of employment.

Mr Goodwin,

I enjoy the practice of law enormously – and my pre law background was STEM (language education came from a different area.)

You have a point about the uptick in applications possibly reflecting the drive by schools to shake applications out of the trees … It's hard to believe it has resulted in no applications.

With respect to your own desire to go to law school – and I know little about what investigation you have made of the issue, I'd make a few points:

1. If you have not done so, sit down and talk with practicing lawyers. Get a real sense of what practicing law is like. That means not only a sense of what the work consists of, but also law as a business – a very competitive one, where few lawyers have a unique selling proposition (even STEM Ph.D.s these days) and one in which most practitioners need to sell themselves every day.

2. Recognise that it is a very precarious way to make a living (and by the way most lawyers regard the Simkovic & McIntyre paper to be tendentious BS, though many law professors cling to it like drowning men.) For the majority of lawyers there is no job security or income security.

3. Age is a problem when setting out in the legal profession. Law firms for the most part want associates who are less than 24-26 years old. Starting as a lawyer in your late 20s to 30s is very very tough. I do not know your current age, but a chemistry Ph.D. And teaching would seem likely to put you at least in your late 20s. And yes, age discrimination is illegal, but it still happens.

4. The public portrayal of what lawyers do, what their lives are like is remarkably far from the truth and an unfortunately large proportion of those who join the profession have little idea of what it is really like until they are $100-200k in debt and have the JD; they often end up as deeply unhappy lawyers and miserable colleagues. If you investigate the reality – know and understand it, and still want to be a lawyer, then go ahead.

JoJo.

I respectfully dissent. In the recent past, I found office space at $225.00 per month. It was in a Class "C" office building that had not been upgraded since 1961…no WiFi and I had to supply my own toilet paper. The Simon City Royals and the Black Stone P Rangers were engaged in a Sharpie gang war on the bathroom stalls. I put in my own window unit AC that I found for twenty five dollars at Unique Thrift Shop on Lawrence Ave. Perfect for a high faluten lawyer like me. There was even a barber shop on my floor where I had my hair cut by my client, on the house. Fees are come and go. Once got a set of new tires as fess too! One can do things on the cheaps. Where do you get $1K for monthly office supplies? By the way, I use the free card stock envelopes that the USPS supplies for Express Mail….Tyvek bags for bigger files….

[M][a][c][K],
Thank you for the advice. I'll keep it in mind during the coming months.

I forgot. Office furniture is free. Previous tenants just leave it all and move out. If you are lucky, find a retiring attorney and she will GIVE you all of her legal books and supplies she owns. Just be prepared to kill two days schlepping them to your swanky new office. (BE CAREFUL. Got to sneak it in at night. Unions will bitch and moan and call you a RAT for moving it yourself.) Lap Tops are three bills at Wallyworld and printers are $39.00. That thirty nine dollar wonder makes decent copies and scans too. Get off your Liberal high Costco horse and take advantage of retail slave labor wages. A ream of paper is $2.99 there too.

OK

The Captain is "taking the piss"

"Taking the Piss." Thanks, I leaned something new. Urban Dictionary says it's slang for "making fun of someone." Nope, not at all. All of these are my own experiences. Class "C" office space is readily available and landlords are desperate for cash flow in half empty dilapidated buildings. Unions in downtown areas "prohibit" non-unionized move ins. I always moved to a new office late at night for that reason.

Cptn,

I agree you can do it really cheap. MacK was suggesting that you'd need more than 25k to go solo, but that's a bare minimum cushion you need to hang a shingle and make a serious go of it. For 1,000 a month in non-NY or non-Boston, you can get an office share in a decent furnished office in most cities or suburban office parks. It will get you an Office and access to a shared conference room.

Good copier/fax/printer is worth the money. $1,000 for office supplies is one-off, but you'll need a file cabinet, paper, pads, forms, etc.

I was never PAYE or IBR eligible, and I have mixed feelings about the programs. I think they drive the cost of tuition and subsidize over-enrollment in law school. I also have a real problem with taxpayers backstopping an individual's decision to pursue law school.

If PAYE did not exist now, the default rate on law school student loans would be sky-high. It's practically zero now, because even if you make no money, you can get PAYE clock credit towards discharge.

Just as an aside, the kind of advice offered above by [M][a][c][K], Jojo and and the Captain is worth its weight in gold to a prospective law-school applicant. It's exactly the kind of information we need in order to make a more informed decision, and I for one am extremely grateful for it.

A few last points – law schools talk a lot about a law degree as an entrée to other occupations, they call it JD-Advantage.

This is mostly nonsense. In certain jobs a law degree may help you get a promotion, say as a police officer or investigator, or as a patent examiner, perhaps. It is probably the case though that there were easier paths to that promotion. However, there is ample anecdotal evidence that a law degree can be a positive hindrance to finding non-legal employment – a sort of "mark of Cain" on a candidate. For someone already in a profession before attending law school, it can be very hard to return after 3-years in law school – in many instances going to law school is essentially resigning (probably permanently (with prejudice)) from your current occupation.

There is an argument for trying a first year, especially in an evening program, and quitting if you decide this is a bad idea. Someone you may hear reading the news daily across the US was in my 1L section and did that – very smart (and decent) woman, good grades, decided it was not for her.

Against attending most part time programs is the rampant credentialism in the legal profession. It really matter where you went to law school – employers, law schools hiring faculty, and even clients want to see Harvard and Yale – and this is regardless of ability – the biggest and most disastrous (for their clients) gobshites in the profession I ever encountered were BigLaw partners from Harvard and Yale, Todai and Oxbridge (who always made sure you knew what law school they went to, while checking out yours (it's always a bit like dogs in the park sniffing each other's ass.)) Going to a top tier law school often spackles bad judgment, smooths bondo over dangerous gaps in legal knowledge. However, the profession cares deeply about credentials and ranking, which is why USNWR rankings are an issue, and why spending a year or two editing the vapid maunderings (non-peer reviewed) of law professors on law review is considered a "big deal."

These are realities that someon thinking of going to law school should also consider.

Better yet and "free," do a space for services arrangement. Go in with attorneys who are NOT competing or in your practice area. Do something complimentary. As a criminal guy, I went in with a bunch of BK guys. BK is symptomatic of a chaotic, disorganized personality type or poly substance abuse. Very close to an anti-social personality. (messed up) Inevitably, these financial screw ups, cheaters and deadbeats either have a revoked driver's license, pick up DUI's or will get into a bar fight. I get the referral. Another idea, hook up with a good PI guy. She will refer you work and then pay a handsome referral fee when one of your criminal mopes gets run over by a taxi. A nice, easy pay day. This is not BIG LAW, but it somehow pays the Obama Care, the IBR, mal-practice nut and puts me in a two year old used rental car return every five years.

To J.R. GOodwin, PhD.,

If you're considering going to law school because you want to be a patent attorney and use your PhD, please consider taking the USPTO Patent Agent exam first, working in the field, and then applying to law school. It will cost you less than $2,000 for the study materials and exam fees. The test is much easier than the bar exam, and most people who use the study course will pass on their first or second attempt. This should be enough to get you hired at any number of firms as a Patent Agent or Patent Scientist. Starting salaries are usually between $80-90k. There is not much that a Patent Agent can't do that a Patent Attorney can do. This will give you a good taste of what patent law is like without 3 years of lost opportunity cost and 200k in non-dishargable student debt (assuming you don't get a scholarship). Please note that if you just go to law school, even if you pass the bar, you still CANNOT practice patent law before the USPTO without having taken and passed the USPTO Exam. So either way you will have to take the USPTO exam, and nothing in law school will help you for the USPTO Exam. If you like being a patent agent and the work excites you, then you might be able to get a firm to pick up your law school tab.

You need to be really sure that you want to be a patent lawyer before going to law school. Becoming a patent agent first and working in a firm will give you this perspective. Law school is 3 years long and will only offer (if your lucky) 1 or 2 courses that will be informative for patent law. THose courses are usually a basic IP survey course and then a more specific Patent Law course. And FYI, these courses will likely be taught by somebody with ZERO scientific experience (probably not even a B.S. degree) and ZERO patent law background. When you see or hear law schools advertise their "Intellectual Property Certifications" those schools are usually talking about taking courses in Trade Secrets, Copyright Law, Trademarks, etc. E.g. soft IP that has nothing to do with patents. And firms don't care about these meaningless certifications. Firms care about grades and scientific pedigree.

For the love of god, do not rush into going to law school.

Mr. Goodwin, I'm seconding MacK's advise, as there is no need to reiterate what he succinctly laid out. But please consider staying where you are at, and maybe looking at something related to your prior efforts.

As for point #3 and some personal experience, I had a Masters in Engineering and several years worth of work experience prior to going back to school in my early 30s. The market was difficult in 2004 to say nothing of now, and the credentials that were so "impressive" coming in the front door meant very little when I was being shown the door three years later.

If you do go, make sure you have a lock on a position, be it patent law or whatever specialty you are looking at. Patent law itself is not the panacea it was in years past, either, so again, please do what MacK is suggesting as his points are straight-up. Best of luck.

The bottom line: if you're going to an elite school, then you have little to worry about. If not, make sure that you're being groomed to be an actual lawyer, as opposed to someone who just knows how to "think like a lawyer," in an environment that emphasizes career outcomes, transparency, and legal practice.

If you go to an elite school then you have little to worry about….

A cautionary tale (and very common)

http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=261392

anon,

Not true. I know guys from Chicago, Harvard who practice in the same courts for cash bond refunds (CBR's) and appear on retail thefts for a few hundred dollars as I do. I know other guys from "rank not published schools" who can write a check for an S-Class and own vacation homes. It's a combination of opportunity and circumstance whether one FINANCIALLY succeeds in the Law. Perhaps folks from Harvard and Chicago have a better chance at ending up in BIG LAW. But who the hell wants to work 80 hours per week stuck in an office with no outside life.

"But who the hell wants to work 80 hours per week stuck in an office with no outside life."

Campos at Lawyers Guns and Money had an interesting post on this which he copied from TopLawStudents (usually an odious site.) I posted a link, but the Spam blocker ate it.