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Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

reuters.com

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Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#51

Post by lawtalkinghuman »

lettergram wrote: post #18
otterley wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are plenty of lawyers out there already who are perfectly capable of making cogent arguments as to why lockdowns are unlawful. But the problem is that they are lawful, so even the most eloquent argument will still lose in court. Adding more voices to the chorus won't help, in the same way that having more attorneys arguing that speed limits and income taxes are unconstitutional won't help. On the other hand, go…

You assume these people entering law school don’t intend to go into politics. I suspect a large number do intend to make the laws. Also it’s not entirely accurate that lockdowns are lawful. There’s been several Supreme Court cases that have limited what they can do in the past several months.

As a software developer who just finished law school, I have precisely zero intentions of going into politics.

I have plenty of views on how you could improve things, but elected politics is about as appealling as a skin disease.

Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#52

Post by tonyedgecombe »

jessewmc wrote: post #28
onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's a plumber do with 5 trucks?? You can't drive more than one, right?!

A plumber with five trucks isn't so much a plumber anymore as a business owner employing five other plumbers.

And the reality of that is almost certainly not as rosy as you are being led to believe.

Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#54

Post by tonyedgecombe »

xyst wrote: post #37
arn wrote: post #9

Apparently med school applications were up 18% (in 2020). Which surprises me, I would think COVID might have scared more people off. https://www.ama-assn.org/residents-students/preparing-medica...

just wait until they realize being a doctor at a hospital is more bureaucratic than actually practicing medicine.

Isn't that the case for any white collar job. Just look at the endless complaints on HN from developers about meetings.

Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#55

Post by tonyedgecombe »

armchairhacker wrote: post #40

Are CS applications surging too? What about other fields? It seems like more people are applying to college in general. Both my current and previous university, year after year keep having record numbers of applicants. And IIRC the CS program is getting more and more competitive. I'm not sure about liberal-arts though.

I wonder if it's people not taking a gap year, after all there isn't much point if you can't travel.

Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#56

Post by tonyedgecombe »

arn wrote: post #9

Apparently med school applications were up 18% (in 2020). Which surprises me, I would think COVID might have scared more people off. https://www.ama-assn.org/residents-students/preparing-medica...

One university in the UK is offering students a £10K bung to defer their studies for a year.

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2021/jul/22/exeter-uni...

Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#57

Post by tonyedgecombe »

gigatexal wrote: post #49

I see the increase in people wanting to become lawyers as a negative signal about society. It suggests to me that the law is becoming too complex, that people litigate too much, and this complexity and propensity to litigate becomes a cost. It’s not an entirely thought out hunch on my end but I think it ties in with how complex the tax code is. To me the tax code is needlessly complex. Sure it’ll likely never fit on…

The UK has an office for tax simplification. I'm not sure I've seen any evidence of their work though.

https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/office-of-tax-si...

Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#58

Post by zumu »

ayngg wrote: post #45
pmoriarty wrote: post #7

When I was considering going to law school I learned some sobering facts: - something like 75% of lawyers would not recommend their children go in to law - there is a high rate of burnout among lawyers - while the public perception is that lawyers are extremely high paid, that's only the case some elite lawyers that went to elite schools and work for elite firms[1] For someone like me, who doesn't just want to help t…

Although average wages are around 75k, wages of lawyers are two tiered, the majority settle around ~55k and then prominent lawyers who went to good schools and were groomed to become partners make over triple that [1]. So it is a lot like other professional white collar professions like accounting where there are huge amounts of extremely overworked people in entry level jobs who were suckered into the perceived secu…

> few that make partner and rake in decent cash, which is only like average FANG entry salaries

What entry level FAANG pays partner salary [1]? I need to apply.

[1] https://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Sidley-Austin-Partner-Attor...

Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#59

Post by Fomite »

gnicholas wrote: post #36
pmoriarty wrote: post #7

When I was considering going to law school I learned some sobering facts: - something like 75% of lawyers would not recommend their children go in to law - there is a high rate of burnout among lawyers - while the public perception is that lawyers are extremely high paid, that's only the case some elite lawyers that went to elite schools and work for elite firms[1] For someone like me, who doesn't just want to help t…

If you can get into a top school (all of the top-3 for sure, and probably some other top-10 as well), they have loan forgiveness programs for graduates who work in public interest law. Caveat: if you're married to a spouse who earns decent money, you might find yourself disqualified on the basis of his/her income. This doesn't solve the problem about being overworked, but at least it makes being a PD more financially…

A few caveats to this, in addition to the spouse problem:

1) You are shackled to this for ten years. Dropping out early isn't just bad - it's a financial catastrophe.

2) It's based on qualified payments, not "time served" or the like, and there's lots of things that can disrupt those. Plan to fight with your loan servicer.

3) Republican administrations tend to do a will they/won't they thing with approving the actual loan forgiveness.

Re: Law school applicants surge 13%, biggest increase since dot-com bubble

#60

Post by hutzlibu »

brundolf wrote: post #20
pmoriarty wrote: post #7

When I was considering going to law school I learned some sobering facts: - something like 75% of lawyers would not recommend their children go in to law - there is a high rate of burnout among lawyers - while the public perception is that lawyers are extremely high paid, that's only the case some elite lawyers that went to elite schools and work for elite firms[1] For someone like me, who doesn't just want to help t…

My girlfriend was a lawyer for a few years. Shortly after we met she went to a bootcamp for coding, immediately got a new job, and now (a couple years later) makes something like 4x what she did as a lawyer. Of course she was doing contract work for a small local firm, but that was the best job she could find in the job market as it was.

I always wondered if studying law, also prepares your mind for coding.

Lots of complex preconditions, trying to find clauses that catch all side effects - sounds familiar to me.

So transitioning from law to coding is maybe "just" learning some programming language and technical details, but the mind is already somewhat prepared to the thinking?

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