In light of Loyola 2L's victorious win of the WSJ Lawyer of Year Award: http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2007/12/19/the-law-blog-lawyer-of-the-year-loyola-2l/, I found it proper and fitting that the Tom the Temp 2007 Beastly Behavior Award could only go to one of the conniving and profiteering snakes at one of the TTT law schools.
In October, TTT law school administrator, Joan King, publicly criticized WSJ reporter Amir Efrati's professionalism and integrity. Efrati, in an article detailing the dismal state of the legal job market for graduates of non-elite schools, criticized the way in which King was pitching a $150K law school investment to naive 22 year olds. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119040786780835602.html
King's post-graduate career statistics were portrayed as being incomplete, for failing to disclose the critical fact that only half of her graduates had responded to post-graduate surveys. King was also criticized for her failure to disclose the fact that many of her figures were puffed up through the inclusion of temporary lawyers, many of whom do grunt work, make low hourly wages, put up with abuse from egomanical bosses, and work in cockroach infested basements. King claimed the amount of contract attorneys was "minimal" but declined to give a number:
"Declined to give a number? When annual tuition for full-time students at schools like Brooklyn hover{ing} around $40,000 before expenses (which tack on another $20,000)? That says it all. If these were for-profit companies trying to raise funds from clueless investors and publishing questionable data in their prospectuses, the SEC would be all over them. Universities get away with a lot, so buyer beware." http://www.iveyfiles.com/2007/09/feast-or-famine.html
As Loyola 2L so aptly put it, "If you sell the wealthy a bad investment – you will get sued. They have the Securities Acts to protect them. They can sue in so many ways: for the way you offered it to them, for misleading statements, even for statements you thought were correct, but which turned out to be wrong. As if all these private claims weren’t enough, they even have a massive government agency protecting them!
But poor 22 year old college grads? They have nothing. Feel free to prey on them to heart’s desire. You want their $120,000 of borrowed money? Go get it. You can lie about your employment stats, you can lie about it being “a good investment for the vast majority of your graduates,” you can even lie about your victims. The 90% of your grads who work miserable low paying jobs didn’t get ripped off, they’re just stupid and lazy.
It’s great that the wealthy, those who can afford to invest in securities, get these protections. No one should get ripped off. But when are the poor, who invest in higher education, going to get something?"
Make no mistake about it, without Joan King and her slick TTT shysters puffing up statistics and selling bags of fake goods, there wouldn't be a massive glut of debt-ridden and desperate sheep plowing into the crowded, miserable, and exploitive "Lex-Pollution" and Paul Weiss sweatshops. Unfortunately, until people like Joan King are frog-marched in front of a federal jury, there will always be a need for negative blogs like this.
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39 comments:
Tuition bandits, men are robbing banks now to pay for tuition, and it's only undgrad!
http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/story?id=3957299&page=1
Collapse of tuition bubble is going to follow on the heels of the housing bubble. Collapse is already imminent. Albert Lord, CEO of Sallie Mae, just threw a hissy fit on an investor conference call last week.
Greasy old Valvoline Dean Pat Hobbs is up to his old tricks. The new SH prospective student brochure lists 92,500 as the avg starting salary in private practice. See page 17 here- the Valvoline Dean even had it printed in HUGE ORANGE LETTERS!
Time to call back Amir at the WSJ and get another article going, or perhaps a suit for common law fraud or under NJ Consumer Protection Act?
This is just utterly fucking shamless. For Christ's sake, half the fucking class is in doc review or doing no-fault! Is Stern and Montana paying 92,500?
Pat Hobbs is the scum of the fucking Earth. How does he stand there on prospective student day and look these kids and theie PARENTS in the eye and tell them this bullshit? He's worse than the people that scam retired folks out of their Social Security money- at least those old geezers are close to death anyway. This lowlife scoundrel Valvoline Dean screws young people with a lifetime ahead of them.
May all the worst fall on you this year Pat Hobbs, you filthy, corrupt, two-faced lying piece of shit.
What a dumb shit. The securities laws aren't there to protect wealthy, sophisticated investors. They exist to protect mom and pop investors. The fact that wealthy investors can sue under securities laws is completely irrelevant.
Wrong, hack. The richest 10% of Americans own 85% of all the outstanding stock. The fact that the wealthy are protected by a powerful and potent SEC and don't have to prove actual scienter is unfair. The middle class "invest" for the most part in education and their homes, areas that are riddled with fraud.
Before you call someone a dumb shit, get your facts straight. HTH
1:08 and 1:38 -- You're both morons (unless you're the same person and then you're a super-moron). The SEC was created to protect unsophisticated investors who had lost everything in the 1929 crash and needed the government to protect them. Again, the fact that the securities laws also protect rich people is irrelevant. I realize that because you're unsuccessful you're a communist, but rich people also are entitled to use the securities laws to protect themselves from fraud.
I have no idea where you got the statistic that 10% of Amerricans own 85% of outstanding stock and I don't know what the real number is, but I know it isn't that. The largest stockholders are institutional investors (e.g., mutual funds) of which more than 50% of Americans own shares. Nice try, though.
Specifically to 1:38: Go back and reread my original post and tell me which I facts I didn't get straight. Go ahead. I'll wait.
Communist? Dumb shit? Moron? People that can't stand behind solid facts, resort to childish name calling. Grow up.
The richest 10 percent of families own about 85 percent of all outstanding stocks. They own about 85 percent of all financial securities, 90 percent of all business assets.
The richest 1 percent of households owns 38% of all wealth.
-Edward Wolff, NYU Professor of Economics.
If you think the securities laws were created to protect the middle class and the mom + pop investors, you need to step out of your parallel universe. Historically, the major investments of the middle class have included homes, education, and pensions. That's it. In the last 30 years, however, pensions have nearly collapsed, homes/education have been subject to massive price inflation and whole fraudulent industries have sprung around these "investments" to soak the middle class/poor in this country. If someone like Joan King published a highly puffed up figure of $115K in a company 10K, the SEC would come after her and go to jail.
If you have statistics of your own to offer, go ahead, and offer them; but until then, stop talking out of your ass.
Moreover, defaults are mounting on student loans, while
credit-market tremors similar to those linked to the
mortgage crisis have begun to show up in the $85 billion
student-loan market.
Sallie Mae shares fell 18 cents to $21.85 in after-hours
trading. The stock rose 7 cents to close Wednesday's regular
session at $22.13.”
Link to the good news her folks;
http://my.earthlink.net/article/bus?guid=20071227/47733150_3ca6_1552620071227-1481722212
I love right wingers with their crazy ideas. For the past 2 decades real wages in this country have been plummeting along with quality of life for the average American. Trickle down economics hasnt worked one bit. You can take your Ronald Reagan BS and stick it where the sun dont shine. You people are destroying this county. The upward mobility Americans once enjoyed is now gone. The GINI coeffecient in this country is shameful. You would think we live in France.
11:52PM, I think take home pay is a better measure of earnings in the USA.
Really, 2:08?
Our temp wage stagnation while prices/costs go up for just about everything around us is a perfect example of how the middle class is being screwed.
Meanwhile, the biglaw associates' salaries and bonuses go up every year. And who knows how much the biglaw partners pull in via bonuses. (They never pay the higher-ups in straight salary. Always 'bonuses' of some kind.)
The mistake that most of us make is making the assumption that doing these temp projects comprises a career - it doesn't. Most of us are delaying the inevitable, a career change. If all we can get is temp work, we have no career.
We are just the proletariat, groveling before for the law school chieftains, indentured to the student loan companies and grunting away as temp nothings in the basements and backrooms of large, international law firms (or even off site). I guess we're no longer the dirty little secret, as we have been outed to the larger community via the WSJ. But we are still the faceless drones, 2008 proletariat, the next wave of those enslaved by technology, fellow attorneys and corporations.
Joan King is of course deservring of this award, but there are so many others, so many liar along the way. Of course there were many poeople saying "don't be a lawyer" that we all ignored, taking the bait, forever changed.
Here's to 2008 and a clean start, leaving behind the bitterness and moving forward. I'm making a break from this hideous work and starting over....not sure what yet, but something with a future and benefits.
10:35, then count yourself as the only ones. the losers on this site don't want a better future. they only want bitterness and a venue to blame others for their own ineptitudes.
Hi, Joan.
11:56, the "pull yourself up by the bootstraps" philosophy is generally a good one in most circumstances. It's usually true that the only real way to affect a change in your life is take responsibility for yourself.
However, the situation and circumstances of a great many temp attorneys is different.
Many of us would like to get out of this racket and get real jobs, real careers. Unfortunately, having "contract attorney" on one's resume for any period of time basically disqualifies you in the eyes of the great majority of law firms and legal employers. Haven't we been over this before, ad nauseum?
Realistically, we can't be expected to "bite the bullet" and take a $40k/year job with an ID or PI firm to "get experience" (these seem to be our only other employment options), especially if we have student loan debts and families to support.
Temping sucks, but you definitely make more than $40k/yr; even though the benefits are lousy, the actual pay rate is more than these little crap firms are willing to pay.
Biting the bullet to get experience works great for those who had rich parents who sent them to law school, and/or those with low/no overhead and no dependents to support.
But it's not a realistic option for the rest of us.
And it's not as easy as "1-2-3" to just change careers to a non-legal one. I think many of us have been through the same drill when we've tried: "You have a law degree. You're overqualified." (Of course, those of us without Top 25 law degrees know that our law degree really isn't worth the paper it's printed on, so we aren't overqualified for anything.)
Basically, we're stuck in a Catch-22 type situation.
This is a realisitc observation of the situation, not hyperbole or an attempt at insulting or pointing fingers at anyone.
I agree with your assessment, it's a trap that we fell into unwittingly...did anyone think they'd be temping for more than 6 months? But here we are, in the classic catch 22.
Here's to hoping that we'll all crawl out of the temp rut this year and move onto bigger and better things (those of us that want to).
You get what you deserve for in this country. No one owes you anything, not even a McJob.
1:58 PM: Okay Rush Limbaugh, go back to sleep. If you think this country is meritocracy, you're deluding yourself and hoplessly wrong. It's an insiders game, if you're outside, you're nothing.
1:03, you are in the minority. from reading the comments sections on this blog and the nasty personal attacks, I can't say I feel the least bit bad these folks are stuck in a catch 22.
People who are cowards and whom hide behind keyboards typing venomous statements and insutling others physical appearance (firm employees and recruiters)because they are stuck in this catch 22, deserve their misfortune.
losers
Gostei muito desse post e seu blog é muito interessante, vou passar por aqui sempre =) Depois dá uma passada lá no meu site, que é sobre o CresceNet, espero que goste. O endereço dele é http://www.provedorcrescenet.com . Um abraço.
An Illinois lawyer is being charged with overbilling...
http://tempinfoblog.blogspot.com/
http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/legal_profession/2007/12/billing-miscond.html
http://www.iardc.org/07CH0107CM.html
The above post concerns a contract attorney....
Filing charges against you overbilling contract "attorney" trolls is a brilliant idea!!!
Maybe some of you NY clickers will think twice before you scam the firms and agencies. HOORAY!!
What about filing charges against the associates who surf the internet and do nothing all day?
What about turning in agencies who report contract attorneys as independent contractors over to the IRS?
Let's have a field day.
Have a field day, but and the end the only ones who will be facing any sanctions are the loser contract "attorneys".
It's going to be a great '08!
Sanctions?
Contract Attorneys don't give a shit. We live paycheck to paycheck. Good luck collecting on them. We can do whatever we want!
You losers can do what you want, sure. Including losing that useless Bar admission you've got. See article above.
That Chicago contract "attorney" did whatever he wanted, and as a typical loser temp, he blew up.
Fuck off and die slowly of stomach cancer, you rancid asshole.
At least I'll have the medical insurance to cover the expenses. Good luck with yours.
Thanks agency guy, as always you're full of pleasantries and good cheer.
http://www.slate.com/id/2180420/
Bad news for associates and good news for temp lawyers!
"Lawyers who work in-house for corporations—making only as much as a third or fourth-year law firm associate—think their companies, when they outsource legal work to firms, unintentionally fund the salary extravaganza. And so Cisco, Pitney Bowes, Caterpillar, and several other large corporations have begun to force their law firms into alternative billing arrangements. The companies push flat fees and volume-based discounts, and ban young associates from working on their business, hoping to avoid paying through the nose for work that could be done more cheaply by paralegals or temp lawyers. They say that by eradicating or at least limiting hourly rates, they avoid cost creep, cut their bills, and better predict their expenses."
lol @ the moron who thinks securities laws were created to protect "mom and pop investors."
"Bad news for associates and good news for temp lawyers!"
Are you that delusional? There is no good news for temp lawyers. Our rate has been stagnant at 35/hr for the last 5+ years. 1st yr associates are getting 160k plus bonus= 180k at least.
Are you living under a rock? Moron.
Realistically, we can't be expected to "bite the bullet" and take a $40k/year job with an ID or PI firm to "get experience" (these seem to be our only other employment options), especially if we have student loan debts and families to support.
Temping sucks, but you definitely make more than $40k/yr; even though the benefits are lousy, the actual pay rate is more than these little crap firms are willing to pay.
Biting the bullet to get experience works great for those who had rich parents who sent them to law school, and/or those with low/no overhead and no dependents to support.
*********************
There are plenty of people biting the bullet and learning how to be a lawyer at small firms who don't have rich parents. etc. You think the associates at these krap firms working for some solo all have rich parents or all went to law school for free? Get a clue. You take the temp job, which pays a little more, but don't get any decent experience out of it and before you know it you'r out of school 5 years and have done nothing. At least the attorney from the small firm knows the inside of a court room.
Congratulations for making to the summit. I bet this such a wonderful feeling to all the participants, specially to you guys. With all the effort and sweats you have shed...thanks for the share.
For all the posters complaining about the state of the law market.
For fucks sake- who the hell told you that getting a law degree was a good idea?
Most lawyers openly say that practicing law sucks, it's unpleasant, and stressful. And, we're talking about the fortunate ones that are able to make a living!
The State Bar in our state has regularly done professional satisfaction surveys, and typically 75% of the attorneys surveyed, have stated they would rather do something other than practicing law.
Really, let's hear it, people. When you were contemplating law school, did you talk to any practicing lawyers (and not just your neighbor, uncle, etc.) Even a little bit of due diligence would have told you that this is a fucking MISERABLE way to make a living.
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