Big law attorneys who complain about the lifestyle

[Anonymous]

I’m friends with several physicians. Trust me, they complain. A lot. They feel so strongly they are attempting to unionize. Their working conditions in residency are horrendous (and they make peanuts), but they have good job stability and incomes once they are done.

I’ve tried explaining to them that the first several years of law or finance training are horrible as well (and are probably the peak earning years for many) and I get blank stares.

I’ve also heard many physicians say that it didn’t occur to them to think about specialty WLB when they were picking. I suspect that’s a function of going to med school right out of college and having little real work experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was recently chatting with a very senior Big Law partner and he told me that he thinks if you want to practice law at a high level (so basically any AmLaw 200 firm, I think was his frame of reference) you need to expect as a partner that you will be putting in about 2500 billable hours a year. And then he said that on top of that you need to be putting in the hours on business development, plus contributing to firm or practice management as is appropriate for your level. So that would come out to an average of 60 hours a week, minimum. Plus if you want vacations or holidays, that's going to push the average up for the other weeks. Client work and BD demand ebbs and flows a bit, so you might have some weeks at 40 but you will definitely have some at 80. And this is for a partner, so you need to assume the work you're doing is not some piddling little low level memo or something -- we're talking high level, difficult work, including client management and managing demands/egos/etc., plus the management aspect of the job in terms of guiding the team that sits under you.

If that is not of interest to you, do not pursue a partnership at a Big Law firm. Don't pursue a job that operates as I just described and then spend your time whining to other people about how you don't have enough free time or whatever. Either that sounds appealing to you (presumably because you actually like work, it charges you up, you'd rather be practicing law and pursuing clients than other things), or it doesn't.

I don't understand why law attracts so many people who don't seem to want to do the job they signed up for. Are doctors like this? I am aware of downsides to practicing medicine (dealing with insurance, the time pressures that the corporatization of medicine put on practitioners, paperwork and document, etc.) but I have personally never heard any of the doctors I know complain about how miserable their jobs are the way so many lawyers do. They seem to have understood what they were getting into, I guess.

I have noticed this too. I wonder if some of it is that the barrier to entry to law is lower than for a doctor? The fact that you can get into law school from any major with good grades and decent LSAT score means that people who might not understand or be interested in the actual practice can do it. I am not as familiar with the path to be a doctor but you definitely have to have done an appropriate major and then get through longer training.

Med school can be any major as long as you have the required courses. In fact a Spanish major probably will get you into med school faster than anything else these days if you have the required courses and are otherwise a top student.

I think it has to do more with the fact that law is not at all what people think it is. No one in law school understands what the practice is like. You do not even get an idea as a summer associate. You are 2-3 years in when you see it for what it is not what you thought it would be. At Biglaw by that point you are living a more expensive lifestyle and it is hard or impossible to make the switch unless you are forced to. It is not bait and switch but it is like you do not see it for a long time. When you see it you either like it or are okay with it. But if not then it is hard to earn 100k after earning 300k. Some do it but it is hard. I had a friend that did downsize (was a more senior associate) -- apartment, car, eliminate student debt, limited new clothes, no trips. She did that for two years and then went to DOJ with no debt in a lifestyle she could afford with a great 401k and a couple hundred grand. Not many people can do that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was recently chatting with a very senior Big Law partner and he told me that he thinks if you want to practice law at a high level (so basically any AmLaw 200 firm, I think was his frame of reference) you need to expect as a partner that you will be putting in about 2500 billable hours a year. And then he said that on top of that you need to be putting in the hours on business development, plus contributing to firm or practice management as is appropriate for your level. So that would come out to an average of 60 hours a week, minimum. Plus if you want vacations or holidays, that's going to push the average up for the other weeks. Client work and BD demand ebbs and flows a bit, so you might have some weeks at 40 but you will definitely have some at 80. And this is for a partner, so you need to assume the work you're doing is not some piddling little low level memo or something -- we're talking high level, difficult work, including client management and managing demands/egos/etc., plus the management aspect of the job in terms of guiding the team that sits under you.

If that is not of interest to you, do not pursue a partnership at a Big Law firm. Don't pursue a job that operates as I just described and then spend your time whining to other people about how you don't have enough free time or whatever. Either that sounds appealing to you (presumably because you actually like work, it charges you up, you'd rather be practicing law and pursuing clients than other things), or it doesn't.

I don't understand why law attracts so many people who don't seem to want to do the job they signed up for. Are doctors like this? I am aware of downsides to practicing medicine (dealing with insurance, the time pressures that the corporatization of medicine put on practitioners, paperwork and document, etc.) but I have personally never heard any of the doctors I know complain about how miserable their jobs are the way so many lawyers do. They seem to have understood what they were getting into, I guess.

I have noticed this too. I wonder if some of it is that the barrier to entry to law is lower than for a doctor? The fact that you can get into law school from any major with good grades and decent LSAT score means that people who might not understand or be interested in the actual practice can do it. I am not as familiar with the path to be a doctor but you definitely have to have done an appropriate major and then get through longer training.

I do think this is part of it. A lot of people wind up in law school kind of by default and not because they are really dying to be practicing lawyers. I know that was me, to some extent.

But I figured out early on that partner track at a Big Law firm was definitely not for me and I don't even practice law anymore (though do use my law degree). I think in addition to a lot of lawyers being sort of lukewarm on the profession, you wind up with a lot of people who get funneled into Big Law because of the high pay (and the high cost of law school -- got to pay off those loans somehow) and who are not presented with other options, nor do they really seek them up. I think the group that winds up unhappily "stuck" in Big Law gigs (while cashing the checks, of course) is a sub-group of people who are good at following rules and doing what is expected of them, but don't really know how to make decisions for themselves or evaluate options.

Also an alarming number of Big Law attorneys have no idea how to look for or get a job because they have only ever gotten jobs through formal recruitment processes or maybe applying for a listed opening and going through that formal process. They literally just don't know how to do a job search the way most other professionals do (networking, making contacts, exploring paths that involve their kills but might branch off their current trajectory, etc.). It leaves them feeling helpless because they are not offered the exact job they want. But that's a solvable problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m friends with several physicians. Trust me, they complain. A lot. They feel so strongly they are attempting to unionize. Their working conditions in residency are horrendous (and they make peanuts), but they have good job stability and incomes once they are done.

I’ve tried explaining to them that the first several years of law or finance training are horrible as well (and are probably the peak earning years for many) and I get blank stares.

I’ve also heard many physicians say that it didn’t occur to them to think about specialty WLB when they were picking. I suspect that’s a function of going to med school right out of college and having little real work experience.

I should also add many are doing FIRE or FIRE light to get out of the profession ASAP.

So I think many physicians have the same problem - complaining about their workload while vacationing in Paris and driving his and hers BMWs and wondering where it all went wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s harder to leave than you think.

I spent 10 years in biglaw as a litigator. I never got offered a single job in-house or in Fed gov despite applying widely. I moved firms a couple times just trying to find more peace but it was just as bad, even when I did ultimately accept a pay cut.

One reason I couldn’t get an in-house offer is I couldn’t move to where clients are because of DH’s job which pretty much only exists in DC.

This. It’s not that easy to get a job like yours.

I’d be willing to bet your nonprofits fundraising department relies heavily on donations from big law firms….so these big law lawyers are subsidizing your salary….

NP and doubtful. Corporate donors, sure, but I don't think biglaw firms are bastions of charitable giving.

You would be wrong. Firms donate tons of money. As do each partner. Most sit ont he boards of at least some.

See my follow up post. It's just numerically unlikely that biglaw is funding OPs non profit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was recently chatting with a very senior Big Law partner and he told me that he thinks if you want to practice law at a high level (so basically any AmLaw 200 firm, I think was his frame of reference) you need to expect as a partner that you will be putting in about 2500 billable hours a year. And then he said that on top of that you need to be putting in the hours on business development, plus contributing to firm or practice management as is appropriate for your level. So that would come out to an average of 60 hours a week, minimum. Plus if you want vacations or holidays, that's going to push the average up for the other weeks. Client work and BD demand ebbs and flows a bit, so you might have some weeks at 40 but you will definitely have some at 80. And this is for a partner, so you need to assume the work you're doing is not some piddling little low level memo or something -- we're talking high level, difficult work, including client management and managing demands/egos/etc., plus the management aspect of the job in terms of guiding the team that sits under you.

If that is not of interest to you, do not pursue a partnership at a Big Law firm. Don't pursue a job that operates as I just described and then spend your time whining to other people about how you don't have enough free time or whatever. Either that sounds appealing to you (presumably because you actually like work, it charges you up, you'd rather be practicing law and pursuing clients than other things), or it doesn't.

I don't understand why law attracts so many people who don't seem to want to do the job they signed up for. Are doctors like this? I am aware of downsides to practicing medicine (dealing with insurance, the time pressures that the corporatization of medicine put on practitioners, paperwork and document, etc.) but I have personally never heard any of the doctors I know complain about how miserable their jobs are the way so many lawyers do. They seem to have understood what they were getting into, I guess.

I have noticed this too. I wonder if some of it is that the barrier to entry to law is lower than for a doctor? The fact that you can get into law school from any major with good grades and decent LSAT score means that people who might not understand or be interested in the actual practice can do it. I am not as familiar with the path to be a doctor but you definitely have to have done an appropriate major and then get through longer training.

Med school can be any major as long as you have the required courses. In fact a Spanish major probably will get you into med school faster than anything else these days if you have the required courses and are otherwise a top student.

I think it has to do more with the fact that law is not at all what people think it is. No one in law school understands what the practice is like. You do not even get an idea as a summer associate. You are 2-3 years in when you see it for what it is not what you thought it would be. At Biglaw by that point you are living a more expensive lifestyle and it is hard or impossible to make the switch unless you are forced to. It is not bait and switch but it is like you do not see it for a long time. When you see it you either like it or are okay with it. But if not then it is hard to earn 100k after earning 300k. Some do it but it is hard. I had a friend that did downsize (was a more senior associate) -- apartment, car, eliminate student debt, limited new clothes, no trips. She did that for two years and then went to DOJ with no debt in a lifestyle she could afford with a great 401k and a couple hundred grand. Not many people can do that.

Not many people *want* to do that. But trust me, all these Big Law attorneys who just can't possible see how they could ever live on 100k a year? They could do it easily if forced.

Which is the whole point. They are entitled. They want to be allowed to complain about how hard their jobs are regardless of how much they make (or how much the person they are complaining to makes) because they feel that they are entitle to make that much.

Also, while I get the reality might not set in until later, it's not like this is a secret. I remember being in law school and having a professor say to me "so many corporate attorneys complain about the hours but come on -- why do you think they are paying you so much? because they think you're special?" It was a valuable comment that reminded me that there is no such thing as a free lunch. Of course a job offering you 150k or whatever right out of school (for me it was more like 100-120k, I'm old) is going to ask a lot of you. As a lawyer, you should be able to logic that out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Golden handcuffs are very, very real. And I don’t say that flippantly. Once you have a nice home, nanny, private school, first class flights to Hawaii for family vacation, it can be very hard to go back even if you always told yourself you wouldn’t get locked into the lifestyle.

You also don’t know what other people’s full cost base it. Perhaps they are supporting other family members, are the primary breadwinner etc. that makes a move in house harder.

This. As DH and I age, we also find the generous family healthcare coverage to be difficult to give up since we use a lot of specialists and have had expensive procedures and surgeries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They may have a SAH spouse or a spouse without a lot of earning potential. If you make 20% of a biglaw salary and are slightly the breadwinner I would ballpark your salary at $150K and your spouse's salary at $125K which is a really good HHI. About the same as ours actually.

Also, I think some fields don't lend themselves as well to in-house or govt work so they may be legitimately choosing between biglaw or medium law where the workload is about the same between them.

Still a choice! How many people in this situation had a working spouse who then quit their job when they realized that their Big Law spouse wasn't going to be available at all as a parent. I've seen this happen a lot. I know women who quit impressive careers making very good money because they had kids and while they made adjustments to their career to make sure their kids got what they needed, their Big Law spouse didn't. Often having kids seems to coincide with the Big Law spouse suddenly working more hours and moving to a higher level of stress and responsibility at work.

That's a choice, too. So is choosing a practice area that doesn't lend itself to pivoting to in-house or moving into a position with better work/life balance. Everyone knows which practice areas and sub-specialties are more demanding and less conducive to those kinds of changes. You might not know as a 1st or 2nd year associate, but after that, you should know and should be making thoughtful decisions based on what you want in life.

This didn't just happen to you.

What are you… talking about. What firm in this day and age allows associates to pick any practice area they want?

Yes, I knew which practice areas were the best for exiting. So did all the other associates. They were full. Firms push you into practice areas that are busy and they don’t GAF you want to plan an exit.

And those areas are extremely hard to get as a lateral for the same reasons.

I know people who switched practice areas in their 4th or 5th year at a large law firm. I also know people who went in house or moved to a smaller firm before they got locked into a career as, say, an insurance litigator (because that's how their big firm made money and that's where everyone was pushed) because they had some idea of what that would mean for their career down the road and did not want to get trapped in career they hated.

You get that working for a Big Law firm is at-will employment, right? Not indentured servitude? Move to another firm. Move to another market. Do what you need to do to craft a career that works for you, and do this early in your career.

The issue is that a lot of Big Law attorneys are people who have let life happen to them. They went to the most prestigious law school they got into, they took a job with the most prestigious firm who gave them an offer, then they did what that firm told them to do. And then they wake up one day and are like "huh, I'm not happy at all, it must be my job's fault."

It's you. You're the problem.

As in any profession, if you go into it for the money, you are bound at some point to be dissatisfied. If you love the law, you'll be happy in your chosen career. The people who OP says complain to her have only themselves to blame. They have choices, but they'd have to take a pay cut, and they don't want to. Hence the whining. I have no sympathy. I've never wanted to make a lot of money, and I don't care that I don't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am in Biglaw for 30 years and agree with OP 100% if you don't like the work or work life "balance" most of the time there are other options, however on the flip - I am tired of highly credentialed gov and non-profit lawyers in this area complaining that their private school tuition should be subsidized/FA more because they chose a lifestyle job with less hours than mine. Many parents at my kids school went to ivy law schools but get FA because of their life choices so I am essentially working extra hours to pay their costs and getting lectured by them re: how virtuous their public service life style is compared to mine

I have never encountered this but it would bother me too!

Oh, for God's sake, STFU.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They may have a SAH spouse or a spouse without a lot of earning potential. If you make 20% of a biglaw salary and are slightly the breadwinner I would ballpark your salary at $150K and your spouse's salary at $125K which is a really good HHI. About the same as ours actually.

Also, I think some fields don't lend themselves as well to in-house or govt work so they may be legitimately choosing between biglaw or medium law where the workload is about the same between them.

Still a choice! How many people in this situation had a working spouse who then quit their job when they realized that their Big Law spouse wasn't going to be available at all as a parent. I've seen this happen a lot. I know women who quit impressive careers making very good money because they had kids and while they made adjustments to their career to make sure their kids got what they needed, their Big Law spouse didn't. Often having kids seems to coincide with the Big Law spouse suddenly working more hours and moving to a higher level of stress and responsibility at work.

That's a choice, too. So is choosing a practice area that doesn't lend itself to pivoting to in-house or moving into a position with better work/life balance. Everyone knows which practice areas and sub-specialties are more demanding and less conducive to those kinds of changes. You might not know as a 1st or 2nd year associate, but after that, you should know and should be making thoughtful decisions based on what you want in life.

This didn't just happen to you.

What are you… talking about. What firm in this day and age allows associates to pick any practice area they want?

Yes, I knew which practice areas were the best for exiting. So did all the other associates. They were full. Firms push you into practice areas that are busy and they don’t GAF you want to plan an exit.

And those areas are extremely hard to get as a lateral for the same reasons.

I know people who switched practice areas in their 4th or 5th year at a large law firm. I also know people who went in house or moved to a smaller firm before they got locked into a career as, say, an insurance litigator (because that's how their big firm made money and that's where everyone was pushed) because they had some idea of what that would mean for their career down the road and did not want to get trapped in career they hated.

You get that working for a Big Law firm is at-will employment, right? Not indentured servitude? Move to another firm. Move to another market. Do what you need to do to craft a career that works for you, and do this early in your career.

The issue is that a lot of Big Law attorneys are people who have let life happen to them. They went to the most prestigious law school they got into, they took a job with the most prestigious firm who gave them an offer, then they did what that firm told them to do. And then they wake up one day and are like "huh, I'm not happy at all, it must be my job's fault."

It's you. You're the problem.

As in any profession, if you go into it for the money, you are bound at some point to be dissatisfied. If you love the law, you'll be happy in your chosen career. The people who OP says complain to her have only themselves to blame. They have choices, but they'd have to take a pay cut, and they don't want to. Hence the whining. I have no sympathy. I've never wanted to make a lot of money, and I don't care that I don't.

I don't think that's true at all. There are a number of aspects of practicing law that are entirely different than loving the law. Marketing to clients, for example and, particularly in smaller firms, clients being able/willing to pay what it costs to represent them adequately in a matter. There are a lot of lawyers out there maybe not working biglaw hours but working pretty hard and not making much money in the smaller firm market.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am in Biglaw for 30 years and agree with OP 100% if you don't like the work or work life "balance" most of the time there are other options, however on the flip - I am tired of highly credentialed gov and non-profit lawyers in this area complaining that their private school tuition should be subsidized/FA more because they chose a lifestyle job with less hours than mine. Many parents at my kids school went to ivy law schools but get FA because of their life choices so I am essentially working extra hours to pay their costs and getting lectured by them re: how virtuous their public service life style is compared to mine

Meh, not everyone can get a job in BigLaw, though. You are acting like any fed/non-profit lawyer can wake up and choose to get a job in BigLaw making $500K+ a year or not. High-paying BigLaw jobs are often reserved from the top of the class from elite law schools. I mean, I guess they could have chosen to do better in law school...

[Anonymous]

I left big law long time ago, but still have couple good friends still at big law. One never complains but her only interests are her family + work; the other one complains A LOT but she likes to do fun things too and is more conflicted. I don’t mind her complaining because I remember what an absolute grind big law was, and this is my friend whom I care about. I’d be pretty annoyed if it was some random parent though, because anyone complaining about anything is just a boring conversation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am in Biglaw for 30 years and agree with OP 100% if you don't like the work or work life "balance" most of the time there are other options, however on the flip - I am tired of highly credentialed gov and non-profit lawyers in this area complaining that their private school tuition should be subsidized/FA more because they chose a lifestyle job with less hours than mine. Many parents at my kids school went to ivy law schools but get FA because of their life choices so I am essentially working extra hours to pay their costs and getting lectured by them re: how virtuous their public service life style is compared to mine

I have never encountered this but it would bother me too!

Oh, for God's sake, STFU.

You okay?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Golden handcuffs are very, very real. And I don’t say that flippantly. Once you have a nice home, nanny, private school, first class flights to Hawaii for family vacation, it can be very hard to go back even if you always told yourself you wouldn’t get locked into the lifestyle.

You also don’t know what other people’s full cost base it. Perhaps they are supporting other family members, are the primary breadwinner etc. that makes a move in house harder.

This. As DH and I age, we also find the generous family healthcare coverage to be difficult to give up since we use a lot of specialists and have had expensive procedures and surgeries.

I thought big law partners had shitty insurance?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was recently chatting with a very senior Big Law partner and he told me that he thinks if you want to practice law at a high level (so basically any AmLaw 200 firm, I think was his frame of reference) you need to expect as a partner that you will be putting in about 2500 billable hours a year. And then he said that on top of that you need to be putting in the hours on business development, plus contributing to firm or practice management as is appropriate for your level. So that would come out to an average of 60 hours a week, minimum. Plus if you want vacations or holidays, that's going to push the average up for the other weeks. Client work and BD demand ebbs and flows a bit, so you might have some weeks at 40 but you will definitely have some at 80. And this is for a partner, so you need to assume the work you're doing is not some piddling little low level memo or something -- we're talking high level, difficult work, including client management and managing demands/egos/etc., plus the management aspect of the job in terms of guiding the team that sits under you.

If that is not of interest to you, do not pursue a partnership at a Big Law firm. Don't pursue a job that operates as I just described and then spend your time whining to other people about how you don't have enough free time or whatever. Either that sounds appealing to you (presumably because you actually like work, it charges you up, you'd rather be practicing law and pursuing clients than other things), or it doesn't.

I don't understand why law attracts so many people who don't seem to want to do the job they signed up for. Are doctors like this? I am aware of downsides to practicing medicine (dealing with insurance, the time pressures that the corporatization of medicine put on practitioners, paperwork and document, etc.) but I have personally never heard any of the doctors I know complain about how miserable their jobs are the way so many lawyers do. They seem to have understood what they were getting into, I guess.

My DH is a partner in an AmLaw100 firm and I would concur what you have mentioned above. He routinely puts in 3000ish hours per year between billable, non-billable, client development, pro-bono and mentoring the younger associates. An average worker works 2080 hours a year. So at that rate your average partner is putting in 23 more weeks per year than your average worker.

I realize there is a very tiny violin for people who make a lot of money but if you break it down by per hour pay lawyers definitely do not make out well!

May you should help him out and get a job.