Law Admissions: Look at the job market

According to Law.com "All together, the top 20 law schools that NLJ 250 law firms relied on most to fill their first-year associate ranks sent 54.9 percent of their graduates to those firms, compared with 51.6 percent in 2006."

Obviously that does not mean that the remaining 55.1 percent were all unemployed, but if you want to see a quick snapshot of where graduates of a particular school find (and don’t find) jobs, please see the NLJ’s graph of law school graduate employment trends.

For a succinct commentary on the full report, please see "Top Law Schools Tighten Their Hold on NLJ 250 Firms."

While the Law.com articles reflect last year’s strong economy, The Wall St. Journal presents a less rosy picture, probably because it reports current market conditions in "Law Firms Curtail Associate Programs as Economy Slows." This article mirrors the economy’s downshift in the last six months.

Six months ago journalists speculated that new associate salaries at top firms may hit $200K annually. This article reveals layoffs, rescinded offers, postponed start dates for new lawyers graduating in June, and shrinking programs for summer associates. It even discusses humane working hours for currently employed first-year associates at some big firms heavily dependent on M&A, private equity, and real estate transactional business.

The silver lining here: most of the top firms seem to prefer staggering start dates than widespread rescission of offers or layoffs, so clearly they anticipate and want to be ready for a rebound.

In my post on "Reaction to Law School Rankings," I commented that I found "There are Only Two Kinds of Law Schools" by Professor Cameron Stracher of New York School of Law to be the most thoughtful. He maintains there are only two tiers of law schools, "those where students decide which firms they want to interview at and those where the firms decide. Most law schools belong to the latter group." Perhaps the National Law Journal data supports his position.