Interesting cover story this month in Forbes magazine. I am relieved that the mainstream media is finally getting it. Hopefully, some kids will take this article to heart and avoid becoming indentured servants to Sallie Mae the loan shark and those awful cockroach infested paper plantations.
“The two disillusioned attorneys were victims of an unfolding education hoax on the middle class that’s just as insidious, and nearly as sweeping, as the housing debacle. The ingredients are strikingly similar, too: Misguided easy-money policies that are encouraging the masses to go into debt; a self serving establishment trading in half-truths that exaggerate the value of its product; plus a Wall Street money machine dabbling in outright fraud as it foists unaffordable debt on the most vulnerable marks.”
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2009/0202/060.html
98 comments:
It's great to see this getting mainstream exposure. The tide is turning!
The tide will turn when people like Joan Wexler and Joel Gora are in jail. So someone wrote an article, great, but nothing has changed yet. When I am allowed to treat law school debt like any other debt, and these monsters are in jail, and there are regulators who monitor this stuff, then we can say the tide is turning.
Law school IS a good investment. Just think about where you would be if you just had a BA in history or poli. sci.
Times are tough for everyone not just lawyers. Try finding a job with only a BA in some liberal arts major.
There are plenty of people with TTT law degrees who do fine, but they do so in private or small firm practice, not in BIGLAW.
"There are plenty of people that do well".
Sure, with 200 ABA accredited law schools and bar assns in every state there are some excellent attorney jobs and some pay very very well.
But 1/2 to 3/4 of those graduating with the massive loans do not have these kinds of jobs or any hope of landing one.
Anyone in the bottom 50% of their class that pays for tuition in loans is asking for big, big trouble and a heavily impaired financial future. It's just commone sense, 6:46, which as a law school shill, you clearly lack.
law school is a joke...schools like NYLS, Kent, and John Marshall should be shut down and exposed for the scams they are.....
NYLS is a scam?
My cousin went to New York Law, and now she is a tax law partner at Deloitte, 5 years after she graduated from law school! And she's only 32!
well New York Law school, NOT NYU, is one of the most expensive schools in the county, I think they are charging something like 46K a year for just tuition.
They are ranked in the bottom tier of schools (that alone should raise a red flag) which means that if you are not in the top 5-7%, you will not be getting any shot at biglaw, and you will most likely have a huge amount of debt that many graduates have very little chance of actually paying it off.
That IS the reality. Its not and "investment" as some eariler poster stated.
Anyone who would make such a statement clearly knows nothing about law school or investing and money.
You're too short sighted.
Yes -- it's a bad investment if you temp and don't take a 30-60K job and get experience for a year.
But, no -- it's not a bad investment if you get out of law school and take any job that gives you experience. Sure, you get screwed for a year or so, but after that the money starts to roll in.
Even if you top out at 80K (adjusting for inflation) for the rest of your career that's still a LOT better than what you'd make with a BA in some useless subject.
"But 1/2 to 3/4 of those graduating with the massive loans do not have these kinds of jobs or any hope of landing one."
No shit you're not going to find a BIGLAW job graduating from NYLS. But, what you can find is a reasonable entry level job at a mid-sized or small firm, or a government job. There are alternatives to BIGLAW, but YOU have to send out a resume to the firms and not rely on some recruiter, or give up before you start because "there aren't any jobs" or "there are no small/mid-size firms in New York."
10:26 PM,
The money does not just "roll in" unless you have the personality and drive to be a rainmaker. I'm sorry but the plain truth is that unless you can bring business to a firm, "experience" only gets you so far.
Most of the average graduates I know who secured jobs are still making 60k or less. Those in the insurance defense mills are in the 70k range, but the billable hour requirements are punishing.
There is a perception out there that people take up document review because they couldn't or were unwilling to find jobs. I find just the opposite -- people move into document review because they were tired of spending their whole lives churning paper for ID firms. They took up document review because it was a job they could forget about when they got home.
New York Law School is a scam. They have more money than God - just the property the school sits on in Tribeca is worth several million. They sold the property that the old library was on to a co-op developer and made a fortune. But go check out the "Career Services" page on their website. It contains links to temp agencies. Some Career Services department.
The top 10-15 people in the class (not %, but people) might get a crack at well-paying BigLaw jobs. The rest are up the creek without a paddle, with $150,000 in NON-DISCHARGABLE student loan debt, with no hope of getting employment that will pay enough to survive and service the debt.
Dean Richard Matasar is a crook and should go to jail, along with the entire Board of Trustees. There they can rot, along with that pedophile Copyright professor Ed Samuels.
10:26 you clearly do not understand a damn thing about money and you are a fool. Having said that I will prove it up.
First, taking a job mking 3ok for a year will not allow you to pay your loans. Nor will one year of working for shit law allow you to move up to that deluxe job in the sky. Nobody cares, there are a million people with exactly the same resume. You think showing up for a hearing is hard or impresses someone? You are an idiot if you think that.
In addition, The result of this action means you will have at the end of the year about 15K more recapitalized into the principal of your loan, so instead of 160K you know have (can you do the math?) 175K in debt.
Oh, and guess what, you now have an even higher monthly payment. Your interst alone is now 2k a month, which means you need to make 3k pretax every month just to cover the interest. Not even touching the prinipal, interest only. So for arguments sake, say you pay 2,500 a month, which pretax is around 3,700 a month, which based on topping out at 80k as you put it is a REAL strech, you will be paying 175k loan down at 500 a month.
Again, do the math idiot, and that works out to just shy of thirty (30) years. So if you come out of law school at at 25, that means you will be 55 before paying it off.
You will have worked most of your adult life just to pay for law school. Not to mention you will not have money to buy a place, or to have kids, or to save for retirement.
If you come out of New York Law school you are not getting a job with government. You will be working for shit law and that is where you stay. You will not get picked up by government. have you even looked at what the DOJ requires of people it hires, or for that matter any federal agency? Most of the time they want people who did journal and had a clerkship, and New York Law school is not going to get many clerkships.
It is NOT better than coming out with just a BA, if you have a BA and only 20k in debt you can make 80k a year ado pretty well. If you come out with 160K in debt and you make 80k a year, you are going to be in debt for a very very very long time, and that is assuming you never get sick, or lose your job, because then the debt will further increase.
It is better to be a mechanic with no debt than a lawyer making 80k and 160 in debt. You are either financially illiterate or you work for one of these law schools.
New York Law School is a scam on the American people. There is no reason why ANYONE should attend NYLS, when CUNY is less than 10 miles away for 1/10th the price.
I laugh at the fact that NYLS got scammed by Madoff.
12:40
You're assuming that you can make 80K with a BA. You can't. Do you have any idea what a reporter or editor with a BA in English makes. Try around 20-30K. That is assuming you can find a job. With a BA in Psych you're even worse off. A BA in teaching will get you a job starting in the high 20s. Upward mobility with a BA is also limited.
"Nobody cares, there are a million people with exactly the same resume."
I doubt that. A more acurate statement would be "Nobody cares about the million hours of doc. review listed on the resume."
Besides, you're thinking too short term and focusing on the loans. The trick is to get the initial experience and then things improve. Any competent career counseler will tell you to defer the loans and focus on experience.
Look at the tone of the posts over the past two weeks. So many posts defending the status quo, encouraging people to go to law school, saying the doc review market will turn around.
The site has been targeted by the people that profit off of you. Whether its the ABA embarrassed that Tom the Temp won its best blog in Careers contest, or legal recruiters trying to wrap up the next generation of slaves, its happening every other post now.
12:40 yes you can make 80k a year with a BA, but more importantly its not how much you make, its how much you keep. This is a fact that you seem unable or deliberlty unwilling to grasp.
When you have 160K in debt, you keep very little. Someone making 100k a year with 160K in debt is much worse off that someone make 50k a year with no debt. They get to keep their money and save it and invest it, and watch it grow.
You also seem unable to grasp the fact that the years spent paying off loans also destroys one's ability to invest and save for retirement, which can NEVER be made up. Once a year has passed, it has passed, and that is a year where one can not take advantage of compounding returns on investments due to, instead of saving, having to repay student loans.
Those lost years can never ever be made up. Missing one year alone can result in have 300k less to retire on.
Even if you get a job at big law, you still come out behind as you can never make up those years of lost compounding returns.
The trick is to get experience? What good does that do, since according to your own argument you top out at 80K, which would occur at some point at least a year down the road.
But lets take your argument at face value. OK so fine now you make 80k and have 175k in debt and the interest on your monthly payment is 2k a month. That results in being just about broke and deeply deeply in debt.
30 years for the life life time of a loan is short term? What in the world are you talking about? That is most of a typical persons adult working life.
Also for your information teacher in New York do not start in the high 20s as you put it, and they also don't have 160k in debt, so siimply put they don't have to make any where as much to live a decent life, whereas the only way to sustain a debt load of 160k is to earn close to 100k or you are going to be screwed. Again its how much you keep.
Teachers also get health care and a guaranteed pension as well as 401ks and they get the summer off so they can take another job in the summer to supplement their incomes. They come out far ahead of us.
Upward mobility limited by a BA? That is simply a lie. If anything upward mobility, indeed lives, are ruined by going 160k in debt to get a law degree from a tier 2 or lower school.
Based on your incorrect statements, I suspect that the other poster who said that you work for a school or the ABA is correct.
Maybe your so called arguments make sense to those who are financially illiterate, which is exactly who get preyed upon by the ABA and these law schools, but they don't work on any one who have learned a thing or two about how money actually works.
Yes, the law school cartel has its minions posting regularly throughout the Internet. They do the same thing @ JDU now, too.
They are trying to muffle our voices, we must be on to something.
I guess the applications are down are down at Brooklyn Law school after all of the Joan King Bashing. Hopefully these poor fools going to law school now have the $$$ for it. Taking out loans to finance your law school degree is a form of financial suicide.
It's just not worth it people! Save your money and start a business!
The fact that a UCLA professor, Richard Sander, told Forbes that law schools' published stats are misleading or outright lies.
2:34 AM and the other law school shills can make all the excuses they want, but the fact is that their whole industry is built on the same crumbling foundation as the subprime mortgage disaster.
The law schools and their student loan company conspirators are not only guilty of defrauding thousands of students with misleading information, they are also guilty of contributing to the current global recession. False promises and cheap loans are harming all of society. The law school deans, the universities, and the management teams at student loan companies must be held to account for their misdeads.
12:40
Yeah, you can make 80K with a BA, but you have to work like 10 years at a company and have a BA in buisness or accounting, not a BA in some useless libreal art (English, Psych., or History).
"Teachers also get health care and a guaranteed pension as well as 401ks"
So do lawyers that aren't temps. They also get vacations instead of forced periods of unemployment and get to do more interesting things than read emails all day long.
You also have to factor in that being a lawyer is a lot easier and more interesting than being a mechanic. You get an office and respect. Granted, doc. review sucks, but that's why people find a real job.
You're thinking pretty short term with regard to your loans. Any competent career adviser will tell you to take a job that gives you experience instead of temping. They're correct, when the economy takes a downturn, the temps are out of work and have no experience. 1 year at a low salary, 2 years at mid-level salary, and then close to or above 6 figures for the rest of your life works out much better than 80K (probably the average temp salary in a good year) anually. The work enviornment is also much better.
By the way, the money does "roll in" if you like lawyering and are reasonably good at it. Most lawyers with a few years experience are doing fairly well. Most lawyers in private practice do fairly well. Plus, being a lawyer is fun.
If you haven't taken a job in "shitlaw" because of what you've read on this site or what other temps have told you, I encourgage you to give it a try. There are jobs available (right now is tough) and the working conditions aren't all that bad.
3:07 PM has probably never worked in a small firm or ID outfit.
Money will never "roll in" unless you are a rainmaker. Law firms are businesses. If you don't bring in business, you'll never make money.
The work environments are abusive. Sure, you are sitting in an office, but you'll be under pressure to bill 2200-2400 hours a year. You will lose some of your hours because a partner will inevitably negotiate down some of your time with the Insurance company you are defending. The ID grind is usually 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, all year. After 2 years, you'll be lucky to make 70k and you'll still be working the same hours.
This is the reason people go into document review. It's not because they couldn't find a job -- it's because they stuck it out for 2-4 years and realized that it goes nowhere.
The money will roll in ONLY if you have the people skills, entrepreneurial guts, and financial intelligence to make the business of law work for you. Simply being good at law is not even close to enough. Some people will thrive even if they went to the worst TTT because they have the business sense for practice. But this is a very small % of the overall student population.
Look, I don't like a lot of whiners on this site, but there is a lot of misinformation by others.
The data is out there regarding determine the value of a law school over other opportunities versus the cost of attendance. The most cost effective degrees are first, associate degrees, and, second, bachelors. After that, it gets more dicey and specific.
The reality is that law is considered by many experts (strictly on a cost-benefit analysis) to be the only degree that the earning potential does not match it's cost. You are not going to earn appreciably more across the life time of your career by having attended law school on average than someone who got an associates degree. This is just a simply matter of averages regarding income you would have had if you had not gone to law school versus income you can expect to gain having gone to law school. The before law school number would not be zero, and the after law school numbers are not astronomically higher.
Here's a link to the average pay scale for lawyers:
http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Attorney_%2F_Lawyer/Salary
20 years out the average pay scale is 114,000. The starting average 57,122.
It's potentially higher, but not especially high given the debt, interest on the debt, fees, time lost, etc.
There are things that could be done to make the degree worth it. But, the law schools are, in fact, now just businesses. Not academic institutions.
Again, reality check:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8901797/
In the article it discusses whether the 3rd year is worth it or not.
Here is an Above the law Post about whether the law degree is worth it. People differ as to their views on the subject, but its not useful to pretend that its absolutely clear that it is worth it. The numbers do not favor this argument.
http://abovethelaw.com/2008/09/value_of_law_degree.php
The irony is that the numbers at Above the Law are obviously not true when one looks at the average income (they use median) of lawyers PLUS cost of living outside of practicing law. What they do not mention is that you also must be in specific places to earn the income levels that will justify the degree. To be in those specific places means you will have a higher cost of living. I am not strictly referencing NY here. Across the board, one is going to face wages that are not keeping up with cost of living in the U.S.
On this front, another commentor gets it right:
"I think this is a more interesting financial lesson:
If on my 18th birthday, my parents had stuck my college tutition (say $120k) in a trust earning 8%, it would be worth ~ $760k on my 40th birthday.
And if on my 22nd birthday, I had put the cost of law school (say $140k) in a trust earning 8%, it would be worth ~$480K on my 40th birthday.
Bottom line, if I avoided school and real work my entire life (and instead worked ski patrol in the winters and worked in a surf shop during the summers - i.e. an awesome life), I'd have $1.24 million in the bank at age 40.
Instead I went to an expensive college and law school, neither of which were top 10 schools. Now I work at a V50 firm in manhattan and, according to the surveys cited by Okamoto, earn an income in the top 10% for lawyers. After 3 years of practicing, I'm 29 and have about $150K in the bank and save ~50K a year. I have two to three more years of biglaw in me, before I'll have to go in house or switch to a smaller firm that pays a lot less. I won't make a bonus this year and expect bonuses in 2009 to be pretty shitty. Anyway, asuming I can keep making the same salary for the next 11 years doing a job I hate, when I turn 40 I'll have saved a grand total of $1.25 million in the bank (assuming my savings compound at 8%).
So if I'd skipped college and law school completely and spent the first 22 years of my adult life chilling and never saved a dime, I'd only be worth $100K less.
It makes the investment in education pretty hard to justify."
However, after saying all of this is said and done, it does not do us any good to wallow.
There is one poster on ATL who gets it right:
"Most law school students are above-average students who would on average do better than the average college grad even if they didn't go to law school, especially those pulling up the median. Moreover, while a legal career at a top firm is probably a better financial move than say being a physician, I doubt it is better on average than going to a top business school and then working for a big three consulting firms or investment banking (on average). Most people I know with just undergraduate degrees from Wharton make more than my jd's top five schools."
This is why the wallowing is not fruitful. You clearly have some potential even if you are in a sucky place right now. Or maybe you don't?
Matasar learned everything he knows from the practices at Chicago-Kent, which is the Chicago equivalent of NYLS.
Part of the problem is that contract attorneys continue to allow agencies to treat them like shit.
Now that you're competing with India, you're not really in a ''white collar'' job anymore. Time to recognize that and act accordingly.
4:09 - shut up and take your bitterness elsewhere.
12:40 no, you don't have ot be on teh job for 10 years with a ba to get 80k. Sheesh a cop on long island has a starting salary of something like 75K, and no degree is even required for that job.
As for lawyers getting vactions and pensions and 401ks. Umm no, lawyer, unless they are government DO NOT get pensions. Many also do not get vacations simply because of the demand of the job. Lawyer is easier than being a mechanic? Are you out of your damn mind? How many mechanics stay at work till 3 am? Try none. Lawyers have among the highest rates of suicide, divorce, alcoholism, drug abuse and obesity of any job. Mechanics, not so. Lawyers ARE NOT respected,people HATE lawyers, you really are living in an alternate reality if you think people respect lawyers. On the other hand a trusty mechanic is worth his weight in gold. Forced vacation? Three months off in the summer to go and do what you want with out losing any thing is a forced vacation? Unreal.
Thinking Short term on loans? 30 years to pay it off is not short term. You flat out refuse to address that, and your salary "stats" are also flat out false.
A real career adviser would tell you not to go into debt for 160k when you can only reasonably expect to make 50k.
I have worked shit law, and I assure you it is anything but "fun" and it is a dead end as well.
Go back to the ABA you trol.
If you could have made $50k out of law school, you wouldn't have applied to TTT law schools.
(I mean if you could have made $50k out of college.)
Sheesh a cop on long island has a starting salary of something like 75K, and no degree is even required for that job.
--------------------
That's a hard job to get. Otherwise every idiot would be making 75k.
7:28 PM, there were a good number of people at my Tier 2 school who left college with a finance, accounting, or business degree. Typical GPAs were in the 3.5-3.75 range. In other words, these people would have gotten good jobs at accounting firms and investment companies in the mid-2000's.
They can't go back to those fields easily, given that the economy sucks and it's cheaper to hire a recent grad without a JD.
Law school f'd these people over.
Just in case you think it is a "vast conspiracy," here's what the Bureau of Labor Statistics says about it.
http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos053.htm#outlook
Job prospects. Competition for job openings should continue to be keen because of the large number of students graduating from law school each year. Graduates with superior academic records from highly regarded law schools will have the best job opportunities. Perhaps as a result of competition for attorney positions, lawyers are increasingly finding work in less traditional areas for which legal training is an asset, but not normally a requirement—for example, administrative, managerial, and business positions in banks, insurance firms, real estate companies, government agencies, and other organizations. Employment opportunities are expected to continue to arise in these organizations at a growing rate.
As in the past, some graduates may have to accept positions outside of their field of interest or for which they feel overqualified. Some recent law school graduates who have been unable to find permanent positions are turning to the growing number of temporary staffing firms that place attorneys in short-term jobs. This service allows companies to hire lawyers on an “as-needed” basis and permits beginning lawyers to develop practical skills.
Because of the keen competition for jobs, a law graduate’s geographic mobility and work experience assume greater importance. The willingness to relocate may be an advantage in getting a job, but to be licensed in another State, a lawyer may have to take an additional State bar examination. In addition, employers increasingly seek graduates who have advanced law degrees and experience in a specialty, such as tax, patent, or admiralty law.
756
First, your using the word "conspiracy" demonstrates that you are not really understanding the arguments.
It does not require a "conspiracy" to point out structural problems. Using "conspriracy" in context is a pejorative meant to connote somehow that we are tinfoil theorists sitting around in our basement discusing alien plots. Conspiracies are for the X-files. Not economic structural impediments.
Your argument is a little like saying there needs to be a "conspiracy" for the banking industry to have collapsed rather than systemic problems that individuals actors could exploit because those structural flaws were left unchecked.
That's all that is required here. Structurally the issues have been discussed ad nauseum. To ignore them, mean you aren't really reading. Therefore, I am not going to repeat them.
Second off, the use of the bureau of labor statistics is not the end all, be all of this conversation. This is a little like someone citing the unemployment numbers without realizing that is only one measure of employment activity.
I provide above countervailing statisical data by people actually in the profession.
The core problem remains whether or not the value of the degree matches its cost. The answer is that it probably does not.
Over average- in actual average- not the median as provided by the BLS- the numbers are 57k starting and 114k at the end of 20 years.
This is not a conspiracy. These are the numbers.
The BLS numbers are based on future assumptions. Let me give you one example. They assume that a certain number of lawyers will retire. What if those lawyers do not retire because they lost a lot of their 401(k) in the last few months? What happens with their assumptions then?
The reality is that many near retirees have said that they will not be leaving the work place because they lost a lot of value with the stock market decline and the economic crisis. What "might"have happened has already changed. The BLS has no way of measuring that.
See, that's structural. It's not a conpiracy. It's understanding numbers.
I think you are lying about your cousin making partner at deloitte, since it usually takes 10 years to do that, and your cousin is only 32. You are a ABA troll
7:28 PM, there were a good number of people at my Tier 2 school who left college with a finance, accounting, or business degree. Typical GPAs were in the 3.5-3.75 range. In other words, these people would have gotten good jobs at accounting firms and investment companies in the mid-2000's.
--------------------
They obviously couldn't. That's why they decided to go to a TTT law school.
Nobody goes to a TTT law school unless they have absolutely no other options.
1034
Part of the problem is the attributions people make regarding outcomes. "If candidate did not suceed , then it's solely attributable to what candidate did." That's your attribution. This is the prime argument of conservatives for he last 30 years in this country. It's the concept that winners are based on merit. Not based on the system at all.
There is no indication at all in your statement that we live within a greater society. So, you make the argument that only our actions, and, only those actions determine outcomes. Not the market for attorneys being saturated. Not outsourcing. Only individual merit. This is obviously a lie.
It's as much a lie as someone saying that they have no responsibility for what happens in their lives.
You assume in our system that someone is a contract attorney just could not cut it. There are no other possibilities. But, what if there are?
What if there are a high percentage for whom that maybe not true. If there are also an unacceptable high number of people for whom that's not true, then what?
People do things for all kinds of reasons. I have friends who went to top tier b-schools, for example, who came out in the wrong year when we were in a down economy, and although they are doing better, they still are not where they would have been if they had come out in an up economy. That's America right now. total local and chance. That's how our society is based on risk shifting. If you do the right thing at the right time- then like a lotto, you will suceed. if not, then you may have more problems. That's not the way to have a strong middle class.
The problem, in other words, with your comment is that you assume that sucess will happen if you do the right things. But, that's not always the case.
8:16
The value of the degree does not match the cost at the moment if you have a BA undergrad couple with a law degree from a law school ranked at 50 or under. But there's a global financial crisis with it's epicenter in New York at the moment, and there probably are too many attorneys.
However, a few years ago, the value of the degree was more than the cost. That's why everyone went to law school and we have the situation with too many lawyers. The tech sector is hiring so the people who would have gone to law school will get MA BIS degrees (the EE and BS degrees are too hard for them). Then they'll be too many programers/network engeners, and not enough lawyers.
12:15
Success will happen if you do the right things, but that's not the same thing as doing what everyone tells you. You're confusing the two.
For example, getting a history or poli. sci. degree because your career counseler told you to do so if you want to be a lawyer and then going to law school is a bad idea. Nothing but your academics, work experience in school, and rank of the school seperates you from anyone else. Moreover, if you try and get out of law, you're entering a tough market because you have to compete with a LOT of applicants.
However, getting a degree in pharmacy or electrical engenering and then going to law school is a good idea. Now you're practically garunteed life time employment. But this path is not considered a good idea for would be attorneys.
In a similar vein, investing a bunch of money in uninsured stocks instead of putting it in a government insured bank account that provides compound inerest because some person said it was a good ides was considered the thing successful people do. This wasn't the case.
This has nothing to do with the discussion here, but I love how people actually believe the ABA, law schools, or agencies have infiltrated this blog. The comments on this blog have been almost identical since it was first launched, so why would anyone decide to now target us? The rhetoric is the same here, and will never change.
1253
I wrote 1215.
No, I am not confused. You are. You make assumptions and attributions about other people's arguments that are false.
Even your comment about patent law is based on false assumptions and attributions. Patent work is now being outsourced abroad. Or, didn't you know that?
Part of any working economy is information being disseminated which will allow for rational actors to make the proper decision. If that information is no longer trust worthy because it changes on a dime or is subject to caprice of multiple bubbles and economic downturns, including wage stagnation, then it's not possible for me as a rational actor to ever make an well thought out decision. This is econ 101. Do you understand now?
Look, I am not one to whine. I believe that one can still work to achieve goals,b ut, only if one is realistic about our society. Our society is fucked up. The middle class is being squeezed due to risk allocation being shifted from institutions to individuals. Those institutions now operate globally, but our government, those institutions, and sadly too many individuals act as if individuals only operate locally.
That means we are living in a society of dimished opportunities. There is no way around this.
You are arguing the standard conservative line about work alone is all it takes. That line is bullshit. One can work hard, have the grades, and due to the caprice of when one leaves school (ie, in a down economy still be harmed).
Your argument assumes there is no luck involved in life. Do you honestly believe that? If you do, then you are naive. Does a wealthy person born into a wealthy family not suceed in part due to luck? Is it everything? No. Is it a part of life- yes. There is no way to work around it. In many ways, America is becoming like older countries. We are becoming more stratified. thus making it harder to suceed. It's possible. BUT, less likely.
That friend I mention with the MBA went to a top 5 program and has a technical degree. This is the reality of our economy: One generation ago she would have been at the top of her field because there were simply more opportunities.
There is no way, in other words, to argue around or compete against a shrinking pie. You can pretend that pie is getting bigger or pretend its the same. Both are lies. It's shrinking. That's the structural limitation.
That shrinkage is a product of the fact that although productivity is increasing the wealth is not being spread around. that concentration of wealth is not producing better outcomes.
1253
Follow up:
It's funny how things keep coming back to a proper understand of risk allocation considering that's what attorney's do: allocate risk.
It's also funny that you assume that individuals are better prepared to understand the complex risks involved in our society (ie, when to come out with a degree so that one does not come out in a down economy) when Wall Street failed to understand risk.
Your arguments regarding individual action does not negate systemic issues about risk.
The rhetoric has changed. You have people trying to defend TTT law schools with links to pay scales for new attorneys...which doesn't matter because there are no jobs available. You cannot flood the economy with 44,000 J.D.'s every year and expect there to be enough new jobs to absorb the influx. For all your comparing of JD salaries to BA salaries, look at how many people are actually employed come May. Tom the Temp has been invaded by the same people that have made you all slaves to Sallie Mae and sweatshops.
You assume in our system that someone is a contract attorney just could not cut it. There are no other possibilities. But, what if there are?
--------------------
I have no idea whether they could cut it. I do know they couldn't get anything better.
And this is the lesson for you people. No one gives up good opportuniteis to go to a TTT law school. People go to a TTT law school because they have no other option.
And this is ultimately where you people don't get it. There are only so many "good jobs" in society. Only a minority in society can be wealthy. Most people work bad jobs and make barely enough to get by.
This phenomenon has been around long before law school, and is not to be blamed on the ABA. Law schools are one of the few opportunities a poor person has to climb up in the world.
Even the most putrid TTT law schools receive thousands and thousands of applicants asking to get in. These applicants hope they can be one of the 5-10% of graduates who wind up with good jobs. Why? Because a 10% chance at a good job beats what they have now - a 100% chance at poverty.
The problem, in other words, with your comment is that you assume that sucess will happen if you do the right things. But, that's not always the case.
-------------------
In no way did I or any TTT law school make that comment.
I said people go to TTTs because they don't have anything better. I said they go to a TTT law school because they're at the end of their rope.
You chose to horribly misinterpret my statement. This is a lot like how you chose to misinterpret what the TTT law schools told you. No TTT law school promises everyone a good job.
Hey, it's the same troll from JD Underground!
Don't bother with him. He just writes the same nonsense over and over.
These aren't the thoughts of only one person. They're the thoughts of everyone but you, because they're the truth.
You can lie until the cows come home, but that won't change the fact that
(a) the vast majority of society are poor and it has nothing to do with the ABA or law schools
(b) If you had options, you wouldn't have gone to a TTT law school,
(c) there is and will continue to be huge demand for even the most putrid TTTT law school.
(d) because TTT law schools give poor people a small (5-10%) chance at success, which is better than the zero chance they would have otherwise
And you better enjoy the $35-$45/hour doc review while it lasts, because that relatively huge salary won't last long.
426:
Here's where you keep making assumptions and attributions:
"I have no idea whether they could cut it. I do know they couldn't get anything better."
If you do not know this, then your views on the subject are nothing but assumptions and attributions. If you do not know what that means- it means you are making shit up.
The "why" is the conversation. Using the "thing itself", status as contract attorney or schools, as an argument is why you are a conservative regurgitator.
You may as well argue that in a capitalist society the poor are poor because they were not capable or the middle class are middle class, but not wealthy because they are not capable.
That's exactly what the CEO's of the investment banks would argue to justify their tens of million per year bonuses. Because they are 'qualified', but others are not. You just regurgitating their arguments.
Yes 6:59 is some pathetic slob, that has been hired by law schools to go to all of the lawyer and law school message boards and continue to spread their misinformation.
In short, the Forbes articles and many like it are slowly seeping into the national psyche. People have been burned by easy credit in the form credit cards, mortgages and non-dischargeable student loan debt. Of the three, student loan debt is by far the worst.
For the bottom 3/4 of virtually every law school class it is an incredibly bad deal to finance this so called education with loans. You just won't be able to pay it back and the debt will haunt you for the rest of your life. Of course the top of class will get scholarships, decent or better job prospects and treated like Kings by their law school.
Is it worth it for the mules at the bottom of the class? The odds are very poor, so in most cases it is not worth it to mortgage your future for an uncertain job prospects and questionable earning power, perhaps only a bit over the high school graduate.
My solution is going to be to stop paying the student loans.
Can my life get any worse in the financial area than it is now? As it stands, my standard of living sucks because I have to shell out the $1,000 a month for student loan repayment, on top of the expenses of living in the NYC Metro area, where my family is located.
When I default, I know they'll start harassing me. But let them harass me. Let them call me as many times as they want. Let them send me threatening letters. You can't draw blood from a stone. I'm unemployed. There are very few temp jobs out there right now and I'm not getting selected for any of them, although I try.
Since I went to a toilet school and 'only' managed to finish in the top 25% of the class, my permanent legal employment options are limited, if not totally nonexistent. Why should I continue paying for something I'm not being permitted to use? That I'm not getting value for?
Forebearance or deferrment are not practical options, either. By the time they're over, I'll be in even more debt than before, thanks to compounding interest with no payments being made during the forebearance/deferrment period. And the lenders make even more money on my already-breaking back.
Harass away, Sally Mae! You're not getting another dime from me!
I hate to say it, but I think the only way this changes is if the number of people defaulting on the law school loans climbs significantly higher, but for that to happen the economy will have to continue to get much worse, which is not really something I want to see either.
Here's where you keep making assumptions and attributions:
"I have no idea whether they could cut it. I do know they couldn't get anything better."
------------------------
That's not an assumption. It's a fact proven by their circumstance. If they could do any better they wouldn't be there.
You people go to absurd lengths to justify your unrealistic world view. Again, most people in society have to be poor. It's not the law schools' fault. They offer a ticket out of poverty, even if it's one given to only 5-10% of graduates.
That's exactly what the CEO's of the investment banks would argue to justify their tens of million per year bonuses. Because they are 'qualified', but others are not. You just regurgitating their arguments.
---------------------------
So you think proclaiming your "qualification" will get you wealth and a good job and wealth? That's absurd on so many levels.
But good luck with it.
Wonder how many responded to the latest CL fake ad
people have to be poor? Umm, you realize that is what the French nobility thought too until they got their heads cut off. That viewpoint is also the basis of a fascist government. You really want to throw in with them? Don't be surprised when you get what you deserve. History shows that this is the inevitable consequence of such a policy.
1:32
A small percentage of low quality patent work was being outsorced. However, a few months ago the USPTO "reminded" the outsorcing companies that they needed an export license (EAR) to do so, and that the patents prepared without the license were illegaly prepared. That means it's very likely they are unenforceable. Export licences are difficult to get and require a substantial investment in time and money. This has stopped patent outsorcing and will probably start a few law suits against the outsorcing companies (assuming the patents were not low quality junk). It's also going to make it very expensive for outsorcing companies (or the attorneys signing off on the work) to insure themselves against malpractice.
Posters 203, 144 and 149
144 and 149 are making arguments based on status, not logic. Well, at least, 144 is clear on that point. 149 seems to have a reading comprehension problem.
149, I am not claiming that proclaiming oneself qualified is enough. That's what the executives are doing.
They run their companies into the ground. Yet, they pay themselves a bonus whether their companies suceed or not.
Merit requires that there be monetary consequences to their failures if your argument about deserving one's status mattered in our system. The fact they get bonuses regardless of failure and obtain bailouts regardless of failure means merit does not matter either in the private sector or public.
As for 144, your argument in a nutshell is "Well, if you are in this place, then you deserve to be in this place." Or, "let them eat cake."
This is status based argument. It's not logic or fact based. It's a set of assumptions meant to eliminate investigation and understanding about what is happening in our society.
Here's how that works: Whether, aristocracy was born into wealth or U.S. banking execs achieve their wealth by bilking the public, they both "deserve" their wealth. We are not suppose to think about the fact the aristocrat was born into the wealth or that the banking exec bilked the public. Both are unjustified gains even under capitalism. Yet, you rationalize it as okay.
To complete this view, 144 and 149 would argue that information was available although you could not have know it. It's ultimately circular logic. Probably of the libertarian variety. It makes about as much sense as communism in terms of the real world.
144 and 149 are in nutso end of the pool.
6:46 PM
If you get a BA from a state school, then you are looking at 20 to 40K in debt. If you goto Law school; it is 60 to 120k in debt. The 20K is just a car loan and a loss than is cope able. 120K is a mortgage that will haunt you for years.
223
That was not a product of a) the market or b) information that anyone would know before hand. It's example of governmental entities doing their jobs. We are discussing here failures in the system to do its job. Your example illustrates the flaw in arguing about individual knowledge since no individual alone determine the market.
Let me try one last time to explain via a concrete example.
You are a fresh college grad. There is nothing. Absolutely nothing on the market. Your offers are waiter, telemarketing, retail, administrative assistant, or a student loan funded education at, oh, St. Johns.
What would you take?
This is status based argument. It's not logic or fact based.
--------------------
This is fundamentally the problem. You keep making this mistake over and over again. Again, only a tiny minority in society get to have good jobs. That necessarily means the vast majority of people don't have good jobs.
It's really sad that you don't get this.
people have to be poor? Umm, you realize that is what the French nobility thought too until they got their heads cut off. That viewpoint is also the basis of a fascist government.
--------------------
Dood you are deluded. Holy cow wake up to reality you idiot.
247
Actually the sad part if you believe your own hype. You do know that in the US historically the middle class has grown, and not shrank? That this is what separated us, and why others wanted to come here? Your argument turns the concept of the american dream on its head. If you want to say here that it's dead. That's fine. But that's not making me crazy or delusional. It's making you an aristocrat.
249
Reality? What do you know about reality? You seem to think status is what things are always going to be.
here's the flaw in your argument: if as you say things are as they are suppose to be, then everyone who is poor is suppose to always be poor and there is no way around that because that's just the way things are. Taking your argument to its logical conclusion- when people steal from the poor to give to the wealthy, as they did under TARP, then that's okay because that's just reality too. Why should we even bother to care or try to stop this neo-feudalism from happening. Why should we even vote or think or do anything that's not your version of "reality."
Like I said, this is all status based argument. Things are the way they are because that's how things should be. A really destructive view of life. It's ironic you would write this on Martin Luther King's Birthday and the day before the first black man in US history is to be sworn into office. The reality is that many here, probably you too, would have said that should not have happened.
That's the problem with status based arguments. They offer us nothing but what may or may not be there based on untested assumptions.
Has anyone here ever worked for Kelly Law Registry? Can you tell me what they are like?
then everyone who is poor is suppose to always be poor and there is no way around that because that's just the way things are.
----------------
I repeatedly wrote above that a TTT law school can move 5-10% of applicants from poor to wealthy.
That's why people line up by the thousands to attend schools like Golden Gate. There's nothing wrong with law schools lifting a few lucky students out of poverty.
There is something hilarious with you thinking every TTT student is entitled to a good job.
Actually the sad part if you believe your own hype. You do know that in the US historically the middle class has grown, and not shrank? That this is what separated us, and why others wanted to come here?
----------------------------------
Adults realize this is as much a fantasy as the tooth fairy or santa clause. Apparently you haven't learned this yet.
But next time you apply to a good job, make sure you remind them of their obligation to give you (and not the hundreds of other applicants) the jobs, so as to secure "The American Dream."
You arguments are a moving target based on status.
If there is no system in which there can exist a middle class (what you call a fantasy), then there is no way to effectively compete. If that's all a fantasy then your whole argument about grades and school is just sophistry.
Of course, your argument flies in the face of recent history in the US and is a version of Stockholm Syndrome mixed with Libetarian thought.
If we can not tell, for example, what the market for any job is going to be, then there is no way, even for my friend with the Top 5 MBA program (she was top third in her class) to suceed to reasonably predict value of her actions.
Remember, I said her mistake was coming out int he middle of a recession.
You keep trying to work around the obvious implications of your argument. You can not both claim that people can go out there and compete to win, but when people point out that systemically this competition is rig argue "well it's just your inability to compete." Your argument is circular when facts are applied to them.
326
A shorter version of my prior post: if your are right that there is no American middle class (the american dream) then your whole argument is status and moot regarding grades. You can't have it both ways.
Why can't you deal with these two facts?
(a) Only a tiny minority get to have good high paying jobs. The vast majority of people are poor.
(b) You are on the wrong side of the above divide.
You are poor.
Stop and listen.
You are poor.
Don't talk. Listen.
You are poor.
Status blah blah. Just listen.
You are poor. Had you been one of the 5-10% lifted out of poverty by TTTs you would be a high earner, but you weren't, and you've been returned to the unwashed masses.
Remember, you are poor.
P.S. You are poor.
"I repeatedly wrote above that a TTT law school can move 5-10% of applicants from poor to wealthy."
Such a flawed argument on so many levels. First, the assumption that you make, that law students are poor, is inherently false. Many of the top students are their because they are connected and daddy helped them do well, get top 5% etc. Many of these kids were already rich and did not need lifting out of poverty.
So your primary premise contains no substance. It's all gibberish.
Hey 3:47 - KISS MY ASS, YOU ELITIST FUCK!!
The people that are most hurt by the higher education scam are minorities. Affirmative action ivy league cases aside, the subprime technical schools and loan sharks that penetrate and exploit minority communities are truly despicable.
"the assumption that you make, that law students are poor, is inherently false. "
If you're not poor then why are you worried about the loans? Rich people blow $200k on their wedding, or even their sweet 16.
3:47, don't talk. Listen.
YOU ARE AN ELITIST FUCK.
People like you are the reason inequities persist.
Don't talk. Listen.
YOU ARE A CONDESCENDING PIECE OF DOG SHIT.
Keep listening. Don't talk.
GO FUCK YOURSELF, YOU ELITIST SCUMBAG.
Stop and listen.
YOU ARE POOR BECAUSE YOU ARE AND ELITIST PIECE OF SHIT.
Got that?
NOW GO THE FUCK AWAY, YOU GODDAMN ASSHOLE.
okay well this was interesting for a while. Now I am bored with the Libertarian nut and the otherside of the coin as well. Basically, these conversations only really work so long as the Libertarian type can say things that they can't prove, and the response is of the type that makes anyone who disagrees with them seem even nuttier. Once you argue based on actual substance, their arguments are not very good. They are often circular. I am going ot bow out now, and leave the two sides to shouting.
Yes, let's get some information about the Lexolution or Update projects. See there are hush hush projects going on now...
I got a call on Thursday about an Update project in the midwest. I had not received a call from Update in over a year.
Don't feed the troll. Whoever this person is just likes to taunt people who are less fortunate.
This is the kind of disgraceful person who makes law the crap profession that it is.
609
I believe I am on their blacklist. Not even sure why considering both the client and my contact at the agency seemed to like me after the last project. What a weird agency.
doc review: the worst job you may never be able to get.
1/14/09
[brian lauter]
If BigGov is the new Biglaw, where does that leave contract attorneys in the legal hierarchy? Unemployed, according to a recent National Law Journal article (and discussed by ATL and Temporary Lawyer).
That’s right, the legal recession has gotten so bad that if you graduate law school without a job, you might not even be able to get irregular document review work that pays $35 an hour or less with no benefits.
As the article points out, the misery of contract work has been well documented in the blawgosphere. No respect, no benefits, boring work, and a paltry hourly wage are the usual complaints. Add Biglaw style competition for jobs to the list, and it becomes difficult to understand why anybody would take a job as a contract attorney.
Until you look at the alternatives. Thinking that I would compile a smart-alecky list of less horrific jobs that pay $35 an hour or more, I did a few quick internet searches. The results were disheartening.
If you aren’t really interested in earning thousands of dollars a month from your own home, and have a humanities BA and a JD, there doesn’t seem to be a wealth of realistic options unless you want to go back to school.
You’re probably not qualified to be a radiation therapist or an electrical engineer, and you’ll never make it into an exclusive job search engine like TheLadders.com with your stats.
At the end of the day, if you’re unemployed after graduation, contract jobs it may be the only way to survive when those loan bills start rolling in. It’s brutal work, if you can get it.
I knew before I went into law school that there are no guaranties in life. No law school administrator came pounding on my door forcing me to go to law school. There has been a glut of attorneys in most industrialized countries for at least 20 years now. It's your own fault if you are disillusioned. I've known for a long time that education is paying off less and less. The fact that somebody recently wrote an article making this point does not mean that it is a new concept. It's your own fault if you are foolish enough to think all doctors, lawyers, and other professionals are millionaires. Then you are just like the envious ignorant masses.
I have seen craziness coming from people about doc reviews from the bitching-about-them side of the bench.
But, now, I am seeing the opposite extreme. Nutso conservatives/libertarian clusterfuckers that spouting de rigueur economic talking points from the 80s.
Honestly, if you are going to troll you are going to have to use language that's not a flashback to the zenith of Reaganomics. No one is buying it.
Now, back to ignoring you.
Exactly 1:56.
It's hilarious to see a loser, who applied to the TTT JD program because they had no options after completing undergrad, suddenly feel entitled to a great job.
And then when you try to point out that it takes a little more than a TTT JD to break into the upper class, they get furiously angry.
TTT law schools help a few graduates get good jobs, but you can't expect them to get everyone a good job. Why would anyone want to go to Harvard if you can get the same opportunities out of Touro?
Rather than see yourself as the victim of a hoax, why can't you people be honest - stop lying - and see yourselves for what you are:
Poor Losers.
And stop complaining about doc review.
The $35-$45/hour these firms generously give you is way higher than what you deserve. They could hire people to do the same work for 1/4 of the price. (And they are slowly figuring this out.)
Remember, most people in society are poor. You are one of them.
TaxProf Blog: Is the Law Professor Gravy Train Over?
... AALS Committee on Research Program (Jan. 9, 2009), Citations, SSRN Downloads, U.S. News, Carnegie, Bar Passage, Careers: Competing Methods of Assessing Law Schools (podcast):
Bill Henderson (Indiana):
25:30: "Employment outcomes do not turn on your U.S. News ranking."
25:55: At 50 law schools, 20% of the students are either unemployed, flunked out, or are unknown, yet the ABA and LSAC disavow the use of data to rank law schools.
Richard Matasar (Dean, New York Law School):
1:16:50: "We are an input-focused business, and outputs are what the students are paying for."
1:20:40: "Law school needs to be about what people need -- not what we're good at. ... Most of us are social misfits, and we're the ones who've been designated to teach the students how to work interpersonal skills."
1:21:20: "We should be ashamed of ourselves. We own our students' outcomes. We took them. We took their money. We live on their money to pay to come to San Diego. And if they don't have a good outcome in life, we're exploiting them. It's our responsibility to own the outcomes of our institutions. If they're not doing well ... it's gotta be fixed. Or we should shut the damn place down. And that's a moral responsibility that we bear in the academy. It's a leadership responsibility that each of us has. And damn the U.S. News if it affects our rankings. The kids are not gonna show up. Do you know that LSAT registrations are flat to down this year. That students' applications to law school are flat to down in a substantial number of law schools. That's never happened in a downturn in the economy before. They're catching on. Maybe this thing they are doing is not so valuable. Maybe the chance at being in the top 10% is not a good enough lottery shot in order to effectively spend $120,000 and see it blow up at the end of three years of law school.
Jason Solomon (Georgia):
1:29:20: "We're mad as heck and we can't take it anymore. ... To the panelists and others in the room: what are we going to do? Are people from AALS leadership here?"
Bryant G. Garth (Dean, Southwestern):
1:32:00: "This group has stonewalled completely and killed any kind of real consumer information for 20 or 30 years, and that's what made U.S. News own this particular enterprise. And it's something that maybe those that stonewalled for some long might have to take some initiative and responsibility in remedying the situation we find ourselves in."...
Hmmmm... Interesting comments by Matasar.
OK, Dean Matasar. How about you back your words up with some action? As of now, it's just propaganda. You're wringing your hands and commiserating with us, and it seems disingenuine, as disingenuine as you've always been. So what are you going to do to fix the problems your graduates are having finding jobs and paying the massive NON-DISCHARGABLE student loan debt they incurred to go to your shithole NYLS?
How about this: dip into NYLS's MASSIVE assets and cut checks to your graduates who cannot find work and who are in the process of defaulting on their student loans. Issue some direct help to remedy you and the Board of Trustee's past misinformation and tricks, as well as your complete lack of a real Career Services department.
While you're on that, fire those airheads in the "Career Services" department, too. They do absolutely nothing except strut around with their breasts poking out, being condescending to the students who seek their help. They care more about making the scene in Tribeca than doing their jobs.
Also remove the links to the filthy, evil, sleazy temp agencies from the NYLS website. That's not Career Services. It's laziness on your part.
How about you and the rest of the staff take some substantial pay cuts? maybe that will lower NYLS's ridiculously expensive tuition, which is a terrible value for the money spent.
Just a few suggestions. Focus on them instead of wondering why the people have caught on and don't want to shell out top dollar for a bottom-level education, which they'll be paying for FOR THE REST OF THEIR LIVES, with no solid job prospects.
From the Law Prof article quoted above
"Do you know that LSAT registrations are flat to down this year. That students' applications to law school are flat to down in a substantial number of law schools. That's never happened in a downturn in the economy before. They're catching on. Maybe this thing they are doing is not so valuable. Maybe the chance at being in the top 10% is not a good enough lottery shot in order to effectively spend $120,000 and see it blow up at the end of three years of law school."
FINALLY, kids are starting to get the message that law school is just a scam for 90% of the class. No wonder we have the BLS and other law school trolls on all of the message boards.
What is surprising, that the trolls have failed to modify their arguments to the present crop of applicants. It just shows what a useless, outdated form of education law school really is.
We need some serious "change" in the way business is conducted at America's Law Schools. Obama, can you lend us a hand?
1:59, that was the illustrious Dean Richard Matasar from New York Law School who made that quote.
You can shut all the law schools down. You'll still be poor.
Poverty was around long before the ABA.
Tom, please delete 3:10's post. Get rid of the troll.
I'm tired of the overuse of the words troll and losers on here. It's pathetic. While I was a realist about my job prospects going into law school, it doesn't mean that I think of myself as a troll or loser for not being in the top 10% of a third-tier law school or making less money than someone coming out of a top tier law school. I know plenty of people who went to TTT and do well for themselves. In fact many people coming out of TTT use their law degrees for a career outside of law, where they are in fact more successful than someone coming out of a first-tier and getting a job as an associate. You people are downright depressing (and depressed).
5:0s the sad fact is that you are a troll. You keep pushing the lie that TTT is a good investment. That is pathetic.
I meant 5:03.
5:03 anonymous is full of it: please list 3 JD's you know who are using their law degrees outside of law and making a decent living - no names, just occupation and year graduated - and don't even pull the trick of listing someone who had an established career before law school and went back to it - and leave out the few folks with a bachelors in Finance/accounting/IT/engineering - I want you to name someone who represents the majority of students: those who went straight into law school after getting a liberal arts degree - we're waiting
I am 5:03 and I'm not saying that everyone coming out of TTT can get a decent job --only that we should not speak in absolutes and that there are other options besides document review. I'm just reacting to some of the hopeless and crazy arguments I read on this blog. I do know people who graduated from several TTT NYC law schools and who are doing well. Why do I need to publish their graduating year, etc...? That's preposterous. (You have no faith 7:15.) Yes, I would not advise someone to go to law school unless they are connected or graduate from a top-tier law school. I also think that law schools are not forthright about job prospects for their graduates. But, I don't believe most people go to law school based on their published statistics. Rather, people go to law school (among other reasons) based on the false premise that entering a profession or more education guarantees a high income. I agree that law schools are too expensive, that the student loans industry is a sham, and that we need reform in these areas. I am not a "troll" and I don't work for a law school, a legal placement agency, etc... I am a fellow document reviewer who has defaulted on his student loans because he tried paying them off and couldn't and was manipulated into default by a collection agency. I don't have entitlement issues and I don't need to call people names to make a point.
Hi, BLSsuccess!
I see you got sick of trolling your monotonous crap on JDU and decided to post here.
Tom, here is the link from the ABA article asking about this topic. They need our perspective. too many comments about how "buyer beware" or "if you can't get a job your and idiot and don't deserve one" lets give them our POV. I hate the ABA.
http://www.abajournal.com/news/are_you_a_victim_of_an_education_hoax/#comments
I am the person with a BA in economics, and no law degree.
First: You can get a good job with a BA degree in English, etc. But you have to be in the top 10% of your college class. In other words, an honors grad or close to it.
Second: The only way to view your education debt is as a 30, or 40 year fixed rate home type mortgage. $200,000 over 30 years comes out to about $6667.00 a year payment on that debt. I am assuming interest included in that amount. To put it quite bluntly, you have to refinance if you are able to.
Third: I used to be a member of the Libertarian Party, and I can tell you that the discussions above did NOT involve any libertarian philosophy. Libertarians hate government subsidized loans of any sort. They are against anything that distorts the free market. Student loans are a despicable example of this.
Forth: Paid 'trolls' do exist. They are hired to counter truth on all kinds of sites. Anyone who says something is ALL good is most likely a 'troll'. Even people who are successful in a respective field know someone (or many people) who struggle in it so they will have a more moderate way of explaining their own experience.
Fifth: Going to college is a waste if you go to increase your income. Same with law school. I went to learn when I attended college.I did not expect, or get a good job when I graduated. There really are a limited number of living wage jobs out there, and many do not require a degree but do require a good personality and connections.
Sixth: DO NOT go to trade/tech school, college, med school, law school, MBA school on loans!!!! Pay as you go, or DO NOT GO!!!! Learn on the job. It is the best kind of training you can get.
Seventh: GET A GREAT financial planner, and put their advice into action.
Now if you REALLY want a degree that counts:
http://www.deccanherald.com/Content/Jan12009/dheducation20081231109820.asp
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