How to Not Go to Law School

As I’ve mentioned on this here blog several times, after I finished my undergrad studies I went to law school. Undergrad, which was at a state school and pretty cheap, was funded by the Bank of The Parents. I’m grateful for that. Law school, on the other hand, was funded by the Bank of Me. More accurately, it was primarily subsidised by the Bank of Crippling Loans. Side note: if you’re looking to fund the purchase price of something, the Bank of Crippling Loans ought not to be your first choice if at all possible. Or your second choice. Or, if you can swing it, your last choice.

As I’ve also explained, though, the degree of pain I experienced from paying off those loans was matched almost equally by the value of the lessons I learned from the experience. On occasion, I’ve had occasion to pay it forward by imparting some of the wisdom I gained.

The attraction of laws

Several years ago, a fresh-faced young lady of about 22 years of age (let’s call her Freshy, shall we?) interned for the law firm that I worked for. Passing her desk one day, I got to chatting with her. I learned that she’d taken the internship because she very much wanted to go to law school and figured that working in a law firm would be good experience and look good on her law school applications and résumé. 

I’d been out of law school about 15 years by this point. Earlier in that time period, I’d essentially say “you shouldn’t go (unless you know you really, really want to)” when talking to someone who told me that they wanted to go to law school. That sentiment largely was motivated by the exorbitant cost of law school. But also because I found law school to be a slog and since had learned all about the market for lawyers, which I’ll get to shortly.

I’d since changed my approach. After all, who was I to tell someone that they shouldn’t—hard stop—go to law school? And who’s to say that someone else wouldn’t have a great law school experience and learn alongside wonderful classmates? Not me, I’d concluded.

Instead, I decided instead to focus on cold, hard, dispassionate math.

Two hump days

In most industries, starting salaries plotted out on a graph look like a bell curve. Small numbers of people have salaries at the low and high ends, and most people have earnings somewhere in the middle. The curve rises to some equilibrium point—usually in the middle of the graph—before starting to fall. 

Not so for lawyer starting salaries. Here, the graph has two bell curves and resembles a two-humped camel’s back. The first curve starts in the $20,000s, rises gradually, and peaks around $60,000 before falling steeply well short of $100,000. The second starts in the high-100,000s, rockets up, and then falls with equal rapidity shy of $200,000.

What the . . . ?

Well, what gives is that a small number of firms in what’s referred to as BigLaw pay starting salaries at the high end (the average top end recently broke the $200,000 mark for the first time). And the vast majority of other law firms, nonprofits, public entities, and sundry businesses for which a lawyer might take a job, pay salaries within the first bell curve’s range. The number of lawyers earning starting salaries within that lower bell curve dwarfs that in the higher one. 

Another quirk of this market is that many BigLaw firms recruit only from the same 15–25 “elite” law schools. To the extent some go outside of the group, they’re likely not straying far. Any that do look a little farther afield may only consider students in the top 1–5% in terms of grade point average. So, the recruiting pool for most BigLaw firms is exceptionally small.

If you’re an oddsmaker trying to determine whether someone looking to go to law school is going to end up in BigLaw out of law school, you’re betting big against that outcome. If you’re an oddsmaker trying to determine whether the average person looking to go to law school knows about either the dual bell curve for starting salaries or the fact that getting a job in BigLaw absent attending one of the 15–25 elite law schools or having a near perfect grade point average, you’re equally wise to bet against that. 

This is where my change of approach when talking to someone who told me they wanted to go to law school stemmed from.

Math class

When Freshy told me that she wanted to go to law school, I nodded and said, coyly, “Oh, that’s interesting.” Coyly, because I took this as a chance to have what I hoped would be a very valuable, if long and candid, conversation with Freshy. 

I asked Freshy where she’d done her undergraduate studies. She named a small, not-particularly well-known or well-regarded college. Then I asked what her grade point average was. She said 3.2, on a 4.0 scale. I then asked if she’d taken the LSAT (a test generally required to get into law school) and, if so, her score. She’d taken it. Her score was far from the top. 

I asked these questions because from her answers I could tell almost instantly whether she’d get into one of the 15–25 elite law schools. Those schools typically take students whose grade point averages and LSAT scores are both top notch. There all but certainly is some advantage to having attended one of those schools as an undergrad, too. 

Freshy was not getting into an elite law school. Probably not even a second-tier law school. So, before Freshy had even spent a day in law school, I knew that the odds of her getting a high starting salary after graduating were slim to none.

But I pressed further to address any further doubt. I asked Freshy what area of law she wanted to pursue. She responded, “humanitarian law.” Now, for those not in the know, “humanitarian law” isn’t really a thing. However, I knew what she meant (or what she thought she meant). And that most certainly did not entail working for a BigLaw firm, such firms generally not being known for their humanitarian efforts in terms of their commercial endeavors. In fact, I told Freshy, if she wanted a job doing “humanitarian law,” she’d pretty much be restricted to working for a nonprofit. Or perhaps, depending upon how she wanted to define “humanitarian law,” the government. And that she’d be competing for such a position with legions of people who want the same job (including practicing attorneys who have actual, you know, relevant experience). And that the number of applicants most certainly far exceeded the number of jobs available. 

I continued by telling Freshy that because the legal market is oversaturated with lawyers (I added for good measure that no small number of attorneys are unhappy in their roles), getting a job immediately out of law school would be no mean feat. Possible, for sure. But far from guaranteed. Especially for a “humanitarian lawyer.” 

I followed up by asking if Freshy had any undergrad debt. She did. Then I asked how Freshy was going to pay for law school. She’d be paying for it herself. Guesstimating how much it’d cost Freshy to attend a state law school in the state she resided in (as opposed to a private one, or a public law school in another state, which would have jacked up the price by tens of thousands of dollars), I calculated the debt she’d be taking on, added it to her existing undergrad debt burden, and related the extremely conservative results: $125,000. I asked Freshy to correct me if any of my assumptions were incorrect. She had no objections. 

I then told Freshy that there was a good chance that her employer of “humanitarian lawyers” probably would be located in a metropolitan area. Very likely a high-cost one. Doing some math on what her most basic living expenses would be I let Freshy know what I figured that sum would be. I then calculated her monthly loan repayment amount for the standard 10-year repayment term. Based on a starting salary of $40,000, which I considered probably wildly generous, I told Freshy that she’d have to consolidate her loans so as to lower the monthly repayment amount (while simultaneously extending the repayment term to 30 years) because meeting the 10-year repayment monthly sum would be all but impossible. 

Even paying the minimum 30-year term repayment amount would mean that Freshy would barely scrape by. That is, once one takes into account taxes and costs for health care. Mind you, this is using highly generous income and expense numbers, living a spartan lifestyle, and spending little if anything for, you know, living life. 

Not sure if Freshy’s mind had yet completely been blown. I told her that even assuming 5% annual raises (again, probably wildly optimistic, if not laughably unlikely), she’d be living that spartan life until the loans were repaid. Unless she fell into wealth somehow. A gamble at best. 

Freshy faced

At the start of our conversation, Freshy seemed optimistic and had a palpably positive lilt in her voice. As the conversation wore on, the smile faded. Then her face sagged. And that happy lilt? Gone.

After that single conversation, Freshy and I never spoke about her future plans. Or about her desire to go to law school. At the end of the summer we worked together, she went off on her merry way. Several years later, I recalled our conversation and decided to look Freshy up on LinkedIn to see if it provided any insights as to whether she’d gone to law school.

Freshy’s LinkedIn profile showed that Freshy never did go to law school. She wasn’t even working in the legal industry. Or the “humanitarian” industry, as broad as that might be construed. 

I have no way of knowing whether my conversation with Freshy had any impact on her decision to not pursue the path she’d once had her heart set on. I’d like to think that it did. But even if it didn’t, I hope that it at least provided her with a lot of information useful in making smart(er) financial decisions in her life.

Freshy, wherever you are, I hope that you’re living a happy and rich—in every sense of the word—life.

Blunt edge

Was I too harsh with Freshy? Maybe. I’d counter that I was just being blunt, and providing crucial insights she all but certainly didn’t have and so could not have considered in making a smart, informed decision about something so important. My tone and approach throughout was measured, and I think that I answered any questions she had as objectively as possible. 

I should add that now, when talking to someone who tells me that he or she wants to go to law school (or grad school), I tell them that notwithstanding what I’m going to relate as to the financials, if they have their heart set on going, and a plan for getting a job and making a career, they absolutely should go for it. Just to make sure that they go in eyes wide open.

And in the end . . . 

Given the high cost for any graduate programs, I think what I wrote here applies equally to those programs. One difference being the market for graduates, of course. I used law school as my example, because that’s what I personally know. And, of course, it’s such a widely applicable example. What with almost everyone thinking they should go to law school.