Jump In The Pool, Its Filled With Sharks

I was browsing the ABA website seeing what’s happening in the legal world outside of the Great State of Texas. A press release caught my eye, claiming that there was only a “slight change” in law school enrollment statistics from last year to this. According to the ABA:

• Total enrollment for J.D. degrees increased from 141,031 to 141,433 from the academic year starting fall 2006 to the year starting fall 2007.  The increase in first-year enrollment was smaller, from 48,937 to 48,964 or only .1 percent.
• Looking at gender for all students enrolled for J.D. degrees, there were 74,946 males in the 2006 academic year, but 75,383 in the current year, an increase of .6%.  But the number of women decreased by .1 percent, from 66,085 in 2006 to 66,050 in the current year.  Males represent 53.2 percent of total J.D. enrollment this year.
• Among first-year students, the number of males dropped from 26,322 to 25,799, or 2 percent.  But the number of females increased from 22,615 to 23,165, or 2.4 percent. Males represent 52.7 percent of the first-year class.
• While the number of minorities enrolled for a J.D. degree increased from 30,557 in the 2006 academic year to 30,598 in the current year, they continued to represent 21.6 percent of all J.D. students. 
• While there was a .9 percent increase in the number of minorities enrolled as first-year students, from 10,898 to 10,992, as a proportion of the first-year class they dropped from 22.4 percent to 22.3 percent.

Across this great country, roughly 50,000 people decided to plunk down tens of thousands (maybe hundreds of thousands) of dollars to go into an overcrowded profession that has one of the highest rates of depression and alcohol abuse, and one of the lowest rates of job satisfaction.

As of 2004, there roughly 950,000 attorneys in the United States, according to the State Department.  According to WikiAnswers (citing the ABA without a link), there are 1,116,967 practicing attorneys.  This article (again, citing the ABA without link) states that in 1995 there were 896,000 attorneys.  So in the course of 13 years, there number of attorneys has risen by roughly 200,000 and some change.  During that same time, the population of the United States has risen by roughly 40 million.  And I’m not smart enough to figure out of lawyers or the US in general is growing at a faster rate.

Looking the numbers, it would seem that every year, roughly 40,000 fresh faces are dumped unprepared by law schools onto the streets to try to earn enough money to raise the law schools average starting salary for graduates.  Does this country really need 40,000 new lawyers every year?  Granted, the 40,000 number is probably high when you factor in those who take non-lawyer jobs and ones who don’t pass the bar.  Still, that’s a lot of people put into a field that’s arguable overpopulated anyway.

Not really sure how to wrap this up, but I have to.  I guess its just an extension of previous posts where my message is don’t go to law school

The Clothes Make the Man

Yesterday, the ABA had a story about the generational gap and clothing. According to the original story in the Wall Street Journal, younger associates are coming into the office wearing business casual, or even worse, jeans. Oh, the humanity. One older lawyer was quoted as saying

“I share the lament and disgust about the general level of associates’ attire,” says Tom Mills, the 60-year-old managing partner of the Washington office of Winston & Strawn LLP. “I think it’s abysmal.”

OK, I think that’s getting carried away. Business casual is not abysmal. Still, the younger associates don’t seem to get it.

For young men and women, a business suit is an uncomfortable yoke to be dusted off for special occasions. “Getting up in the morning and putting on a suit is hard,” says Sara Shikhman, a 26-year-old legal associate at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP in New York. She says she hasn’t worn one in six months.

Oh boo hoo. You work at a firm that pays 160K to first year associates and you can’t be bothered to put on a suit? I don’t exactly feel bad for Ms. Shikhman.

Even though I’m not even thirty yet, I’m actually inclined to agree with Mr. Mills here. Not in the part that wearing jeans should be punishable by 30 lashes, but that if you’re going to be an attorney, especially a younger one, you should look the part. I say this for two reasons.

First off, the ZZ Top song is true. The ladies do, in fact, go crazy for a sharp dressed man. I’ve noticed if I go to the store after court and I’m in a suit, I get some looks from fairly attractive women.

The second reason being a young attorney, you come across plenty of people who think that based on age, you don’t know your ass from a hole in the ground. And I know that being an attorney is a career where you’re always learning something new, I’d like to think that I retained at least a few nuggets of legal knowledge from law school that I can apply to a client’s situation.

This is where looking the part comes in. Meeting the client and looking like what their mental picture of what a lawyer should look like (especially the first time) seems to help reassure them that I might just know what I’m talking about.   Even if I don’t.