The days of top law school graduates’ having their pick of six-figure jobs at boutique firms—or even of being assured of putting their degrees to immediate use—are over. Post-graduate employment rates are at their lowest levels in 15 years. The typical student leaves school nearly $100,000 in debt. And after several years of recession-driven enrollment gains, applications to law schools nationwide are down nearly 10% this year. The sobering statistics have prompted plenty of soul-searching in the legal academy, with calls for schools to provide more accurate job-placement data as well as efforts at some law schools to admit fewer students to avoid dumping a glut of newly minted J.D.s on a saturated job market. “The sense that one can go to law school and get rich quick, that it is the lottery ticket—those days are well past,” says Dean Larry Dessem at the University of Missouri’s School of Law, where first-year fall enrollment is down 11% and applications declined nearly 17%. According to the National Association for Law Placement, only slightly more than two-thirds of spring 2010 graduates had jobs requiring law licenses nine months later—the lowest mark since the industry group starting keeping count. Overall, 87.4% of the class of 2010 had some sort of job nine months after graduation, a 15-year low. Those figures include 11% working part-time and others holding temporary jobs. And the national median salary for new law school graduates declined from $72,000 to $63,000 over the past year.
Today’s question: Do you think enrolling in law school is still a good career decision?
