Timing Law School

March 10th, 2015 / By Deborah J. Merritt

Michael Simkovic and Frank McIntyre have a new paper analyzing historic income data for law school graduates. In this article, a supplement to their earlier paper on the lifetime value of a law degree, Simkovic and McIntyre conclude that graduates reap most of the value of a JD whether they graduate in good economic times or poor ones. (Simkovic, by the way, just won an ALI Young Scholar Medal. Congratulations, Mike!)

Simkovic and McIntyre’s latest analyses, they hope, will reassure graduates who earned their degrees in recent years. If history repeats, then these JDs will reap as much financial benefit over their lifetimes as those in previous generations. Simkovic and McIntyre also warn prospective students against trying to “time” law school. It’s difficult to estimate business cycles several years in advance, when a 0L must decide whether to take the plunge. And, again according to historical data, timing won’t make much difference. Under most circumstances, delay will cost more financially than any reward that successful timing could confer.

But Is This Time Different?

History does repeat, at least in the sense of economic conditions that cycle from good to bad and back again. There’s no doubt that recent law school graduates have suffered poor job outcomes partly because of the Great Recession and slow recovery. It’s good to know that graduates may be able to recover financially from the business-cycle component of their post-graduation woes. Although even here, Simkovic and McIntyre acknowledge that past results cannot guarantee future performance. The Great Recession may produce aftershocks that differ from earlier recessions.

All of this, though, edges around the elephant in the room: Have shifts occurred in the legal profession that will make that work less remunerative or less satisfying to law graduates? And/or have changes occurred that will make remunerative, satisfying work available to a smaller percentage of law graduates?

Simkovic and McIntyre have limited data on those questions. Their primary dataset does not yet include anyone who earned a JD after 2008. A supplemental analysis seems to encompass some post-2008 degree holders, but the results are limited. Simkovic and McIntyre remain confident that any structural change will help, rather than hurt, law graduates–but their evidence speaks to that issue only in historical terms at best. What is actually happening in the workplace today?

The Class of 2010

Five years ago, the Class of 2010 was sitting in our classrooms, anticipating graduation, dreading the bar exam, and worrying about finding a job. Did they find jobs? What kind of work are they doing?

I decided to find out by tracking employment results for more than 1,200 graduates from that year. I’ll be releasing that paper later this week, but here’s a preview: the class’s employment pattern has not improved much from where it stood nine months after graduation. The results are strikingly low compared to the Class of 2000 (the one followed by the massive After the JD study). The decline in law firm employment is particularly marked: just 40% of the group I followed works in a law firm of any size, compared to 62.3% for the Class of 2000 at a similar point in their careers.

A change of that magnitude, in the primary sector (law firms) that hires new law graduates, smacks of structural change. I’m not talking just about BigLaw; these changes pervaded the employment landscape. Stay tuned.