Lawyer Jobs - Are they Glamorous Anymore?

Have you seen the new legal series on ABC, The Deep End? The freshman corporate lawyers on the show lead glamorous lives; they spend their days in snappy suits, work at a civilized pace, obtain appreciation and hope from their superiors, and have the time and energy for flirting, small talk and the small pleasures of a white-collar job. Life in the fictional superrich law firm of Sterling Huddle Oppenheim & Craft in the show, seems as removed from everyday life as it physically is, played out as it is in a glass skyscraper high above Los Angeles. The only allowance made to reality in the show comes from tough-man grumblings of how they have to manage out with the workload. The show was written two years ago, in the days before the meltdown, and in today's environment of factory lawyer jobs, it seems pathetically outdated.

There are no more starting salaries closing in on $200,000 a year; there are no corporate perks, no fast tracks to partnership, and certainly no champagne and massages in the evenings. The legal profession is in one of its worst low points in years. Lawyer jobs are being trimmed everywhere - there were nearly 5000 cutbacks last year. Great legal employment today would be being employed at all, in a new job, perhaps, defending the poor for a living wage. Lawyers today get paid for the results they bring in, not for potential. The pressure to perform is relentless, and can drive fresh law graduates to gladly embrace an alternative career, tending bar.

Students who began law school a few years ago when it was all roses and champagne, entered, after graduating, a world of changed rules in legal employment. They woke up from their dreams of fame and fortune into this heedless, dog-eat-dog world. Corporate lawyers have traditionally found their billable hours coming from real estate, financial services, and the tech industry. All these industries have suffered terribly in the great recession of 2008. There are no more billable hours; jobs get paid by the case. And an associate at a law firm who performs very competently at the lawyer jobs he is handed, still has no guarantee of employment. Someone who brings in business, wins in litigation, or rallies the team around, and does all this at a major law firm and has a major degree, still is often expendable. Lawyers have certainly been lining up for therapy for anxiety and depression.

Law graduates are even willing to take a major pay cut in return for reasonable, steady employment; but lawyer jobs like that are luxury too in today's environment. It might be hard to believe it, but lawyer jobs that ask of you nothing greater than a steady civilized pace today, pay nothing more than a job flipping burgers at McDonald's, if you would look at the hourly rate. They need to be competing with what lawyers charge over in China, the Philippines and Bangalore. India has made a difference. Lawyer jobs are being farmed out, outsourced. Lawyers used to have fight in them to protest anything that compromised on their rights. With compromise crowding them from every direction, protest and struggle are no longer a lawyer's option.