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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm a part time attorney - and it is definitely worth it to me. I'm on a 70% schedule, but with decent flexibility even within that schedule.  So it means I can drop my son off at 8:45 when preschool starts (instead of dropping him off into the chaos of beforecare) and roll into work at 9:20 or so.  Then I work, get in a 30-minute workout a couple times a week, leave by 4 and either pick up my son before aftercare starts at 4:30 or I can go do errands, or just have 20 minutes of alone time before picking him up.  It means I can do the (many) dr appointments for both him and me, hair appointments, etc etc there is always something, and not worry about having to work 2 hours that night to keep my billable hours where they need to be.  So it means I can fit all the crap that needs to get done (errands, appointments, work, working out) into a basic 9-5:30 work day and be home in time to make dinner every night without too much stress.  It has not been a mommy track for me, as I have made it clear I am very focused on my career (made partner already, very focused on business development).

One complaint many attorneys who go part time have is that they are paid for 70% of their schedule but because of the demands on attorneys, they are working less than a 100% schedule but more than 70% - with admin expectations, and constant calls and emails on their "off time". you get to bill the time, but you feel like you're almost working full time still sometimes, even though the billable hours don't add up to that. Like, if you have to jump on to two 1-hour client calls on your day off (if you work 3 days a week), suddenly the day feels a lot more like a work day than a day-off, and you wonder if it wouldn't just be easier to go back to full time and get paid the extra 30%. That's the general complaint. And I have colleagues who barely work more than me but are technically full time - just not making their hours and no one is asking too many questions.  And they've been advised not to make the switch to PT because you might as well keep getting paid for a full time schedule.  I've weighed this decision, but when I do the math (husband makes around $500k, and I make around $250k) if I went full time it'd be another 100k or so, which is $60k after tax. Do I care about $60k in the grand scheme of our very high household income?  I'd rather just stay PT, lose out on that potential cash, but not have any undue pressure to be working more than I do.  [/quote]

I'm this PP and wanted to add:

After my son was born, I went into a very PT job where I was only making like $45k for 8-10 hours a week from home. It barely covered childcare costs, but was still worth it to me because I did that for a couple years and kept my resume fresh, so that I was able to jump back into a more regular schedule when I was ready.  So definitely worth it for me, even when it didn't really produce any extra cash in the bank. [/quote]

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