The Dallas Morning News reports that Texas House Speaker Joe Straus is “hopeful” that the legislature will approve a bill to bring a University of North Texas Law School to downtown Dallas, Texas.
That is just what this country needs in a time of economic crisis. A crisis that includes massive attorney layoffs unprecedented in legal history. It makes perfect sense. When attorneys who have graduated from elite schools are being laid off in droves, what do we do? In a time when many argue that there are too many law schools what do we do? We add a law school which will probably turn out for the most part unemployable tier 4 attorneys. Unemployable unless they hang out their own shingle adding to the solo masses. That is not to say that a tier 4 school does not turn out talented attorneys. Of course they do. They are turning out talented attorneys who even in good times are often at the back of the job bus. In a time when even top tier grads are struggling for employment, the numbers for these lower tier schools have to be horrendous and will only get worse.
This country all ready has 70 percent of the worlds attorneys. We do not need more shingles. Should the fact that the Dallas area does not have a state law school take precedence over the fact that the lawyers turned out when it does will be on the bread line draining our infrastructure with unemployment claims and defaulted school loans? At least the bankruptcy lawyers will be busy filing bankruptcy petitions for new law grads. Whose interests are we protecting?
This last Friday, termed “Black Friday” in legal circles, Latham and Watkins, one of the biggest and most profitable law firms in the country layed off 8 percent of it’s work force. Accoridng the the Law Shucks layoff tracker there have been here have been over 4,500 layoffs since January 1, 2008. There have been 2,915 (1,231 attorneys, 1,684 staff) in calendar 2009 – 1,375 (537 attorneys, 838 staff) in February alone(not including the Latham layoffs) . The market should determine the need for more attorneys, not politicians with self serving agendas. There are those predicting that it could take as many as five years for the legal market to turn around. Even if it does it may not return in the same form. We should wait and see before we start throwing more unsuspecting legal sheep to wolves. If all else fails, there are bailout funds available for just about everyone else, why can’t we join the party?
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March 2nd, 2009 at 4:18 am
I had no idea the legal market was hit so quickly. The company I work for had a record year in 2008, and followed suit by laying off 10% of the workforce at the end of the year. It is arguable that ANY new schools are unwarranted, besides perhaps new programs for repo-men, gun salesmen, and gardeners.
March 2nd, 2009 at 9:07 pm
the guy in the pic needs a better sign…LOL
and he can review my documents…I've got some Cheerios and some Raisin Bran, but little milk…
March 3rd, 2009 at 1:00 am
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, as of 2/6/09, employment in the construction industry has fallen by about one million since its peak in January of 2007. In comparison lawyers have kind of a sweet deal. I have never seen a comparison of the number of lawyers to the growth in the U.S. Population. Do you have one? I was thinking that 1.1 million lawyers wasn't really too many for 305,928,320 people, considering that just over half of them actuallly go into private practice. I don't live in a big city, but I'm not tripping over lawyers here.
March 3rd, 2009 at 4:38 pm
Let me first say this: There are way too many lawyers. Most of the one's I know under 35 struggle, as do I. But if you feel like crunching numbers on it:
I have a spreadsheet on this, but its not deeply historical, if you would like to add older data to another sheet, please feel free. The ABA supplies info on lawyer population by state going way back (i think).
http://www.ryalslawfirm.com/personal/Attorneys%20…
ryalslawfirm(—at—)gmail.com
March 11th, 2009 at 2:31 pm
The Legal Industry bubble walked in sync with the stock market and housing bubble. When firms are paying newbies $165k just for passing the exam and walking in the door, then you know something is wrong. This was not sustainable even in the best of times.
The answer: Layoff bottom 10% associates/paralegals, stop all hiring, make 2nd/3rd year associates do newbie work, make low-level partners come to the office more than twice a week, and then wait for the recovery while the senior partners collect a bigger share. Brilliant!
March 15th, 2009 at 4:54 am
What is a tier 4 school? I don't think this guy knows what he is talking about. Right now lawyers are out of reach for 75% of Americans. So a little competition would be nice. As far as layoffs of 8%…Well that is one industry that must be bulletproof. Who are these talented attorneys you speak about. Are they Harvard and Yale types that can handle my buddy's divorce! Or maybe setup a small business LLC. How can you discuss law when you do not even know what the f*** you are talking about. Utter nonsense! In your scenario you must be from the law establishment…ie rich kid..from a private school like SMU? Whatever happened to the person who works right out of college has a family and then decides to get his/her JD. If they live in Dallas or FW area then they must move to Austin and get I guess you would call a UT Law degree maybe 3rd tier.
Just remember the next time you get busted for a DWI or smoking a joint, that will be minimum $15 large. Yes with more lawyers competing for their clients then you can push that price down! When is the last time you really considered calling an attorney for getting fucked? That is right you did not! Why because you are poor? No because all the tier 1's are printing money for the large corps.
Please in the future when you post your blog. Put some thought into it. Your comment and the comments of your readers is downright …. well I have faith you will put more thought into it next time.
Sincerely,
Your dad….someone has to set you straight and not just S.Y.D and say how proud!
September 3rd, 2011 at 8:04 am
There may be many lawyers, but there is always room for a great lawyer. It is not difficult to do well financially as a lawyer, as long as you take risks and develop your firm in a leveraged way such that you have multiple revenue streams. Working for BigLaw is a waste of time from a financial perspective and is akin to working three full time jobs at 40k-50k each yearly. As a young lawyer, I have done better than I ever imagined on my own and the sky is the limit. Having a law license is a license to print money if it is in the hands of a capable, innovative person. I do agree that they let far too many sheeps into law school. They lack innovation and just take up space. Many lawyers are idiots and cannot think outside the box to save their life. Additionally, why would someone want to bill hourly when they can hit the lottery by taking contingency only cases or leveraged contingency hourly cases? As you can see, there are many ways to make money as a lawyer. You get out of law what you put into it. However, being a lawyer is not for the weak minded.