8,000. That's a pretty good number … for a North Korean nuclear test. Speaking of an entity that publishes a hagiography to each new leader, depends on an outside government's support to sustain its moribund economy, and focuses solely on self-preservation and keeping the peasants in line while espousing otherworldly, yet high-minded ideals, read about the AALS meeting here. Next step is to set up re-education camps and charge $50K tuition.
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t17.htm
| Not seasonally adjusted | December | 2014 | 1,124,200 | |
| October | 2015 | 1,127,900 | ||
| November | 2015 | 1,128,800 | ||
| December | 2015 | 1,133,100 | 8,900 | |
| Seasonally adjusted | December | 2014 | 1,120,000 | |
| October | 2015 | 1,126,600 | ||
| November | 2015 | 1,126,800 | ||
| December | 2015 | 1,128,000 | 8,000 | |
| Change from Nov-15 to Dec-15 | 1,200 |
I look at this photo and it pisses me off. Why? When I started out in law, we used floppies. In my RANKED, tough to get into 3.5 GPA law school, we used 5.25 floppies made by Maxell. When I got out we used 3.5 inch floppies. You went to Elek-Tex and purchased a box of floppies. Why am I made as hell? Because we don't use floppies anymore and law school admission standards are practically nonexistent today. I don't know if there s a nexus between no floppies and lack of law school standards. I am pissed because the law deans and Prawfs glutted the attorney market. I am pissed about floppies because I can't just "purchase" floppies of Microsoft Word and use it for years on end in multiple computers (my own--don't nag me about piracy). Now for the same money, they make you buy a damn license and the program is down loaded from the storm cloud. That license, surprise, surprise only lasts one year and then poof it is gone. At least when I had floppies....when law schools had selective standards business was ok....
ReplyDeleteWhy do you hate innovation?
DeleteWhen innovation means turning a buy-once and its yours forever product into a stream of outward-bound payments to keep what you've already purchased working, that innovation is rightfully hated.
ReplyDeleteThe ABA, mindlessly echoing a mindless Bloomberg piece, put out a similar puff piece last Friday.
ReplyDeleteIf the ABA and Bloomberg were seeking to be honest the headline would read, “Legal sector employment growth underperforms the overall economy by 1.3% in 2015.” Obviously honesty and perspective would be asking too much of journalists.
The ABA's "10,000 jerbs was gained!" number is wrong. (http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/10000_jobs_were_added_to_the_legal_sector_in_2015_stats_show). It is even more wrong since this figure measures from January 2015 to December 2015...as though January 1 through December 1 is a full year.
Let's assume that the BLS data is correct. And let's use the actual numbers rather than the seasonally-adjusted numbers (which interpolate based on cyclical trends that have been unstable since 2008). The result: legal sector employment rose by 8,900 in 2015.
An 8,900 increase = .8% growth. However, aggregate job growth across the whole economy was 2.1%. So glorifying the .8% growth is sort of like bragging about getting a D+. See, e.g., https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fIs-f-jaZY.
The fact is that the legal sector is not improving on par with the rest of the economy. Whether that's good or bad for the rest of the economy is another question. But if the ABA is hoping to imply "everything is awesome, open the floodgates of 1Ls!!," they are dead wrong.
There is objectively a surplus of JDs being created. The foreseeable improvements to the employment situation are a testament to supply-side economics solving a problem created by the law schools, in turn led by a complicit ABA. (Law schools haven't done a damn thing to make employment prospects better for their graduates - fewer graduates mean that the completion is marginally better amongst themselves.)
Bottom line: until either (1) 1L enrollment drops below 29,000, or (2) tuition is limited to at a rate where young lawyers can repay debt while working for the underserved (and I see no reason why these criteria must be mutually exclusive) the ABA is doing a disservice to the "profession" it claims to promote.