Anonymous wrote:Former big law associate here. Now, fed attorney. I saw a lot of partners who took long lunches, long dinners, read the paper at their desk. They seemed to enjoy office time more than actual personal time. This led to other people working longer hours because if the boss takes a long late lunch, meetings start late, last longer.... Boss doesn't review work until after finishes long dinner and read the paper.... It seemed to me, the desire to stY at work or be in he office was stronger than going home. It wasn't that they wre always working but delaying which caused others to delay going home too.

This. Absolutely.

I made a deliberate decision out of law school to chose a Small Law career. (Clerkship then small boutique firm). All y'all are making me glad I made that choice. Your hours would not work for me. I don't care if I'm not making as much as I could. I don't want a Big Law life.

DH works these insane hours as a gov't employee (out at 6:30 am, home at 9-10 pm) and is not compensated nearly as much as BigLaw would pay. It's not just Big Law. It would be awfully nice to have these kinds of pay checks, though.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When will the politicians talk about the real problem of income inequality with lawyers not ceos or wallstreet. Oh wait obama , edwards, clintons were lawyers

You're upset about income "inequality" with people who spend $100,000 on graduate school, wrk SIX days a week, 9 a.m. to 10 p.m.?

Lots of people work those types of hours and barely make $30K because they have to work multiple jobs and yes, they are paying off school loans too. Perhaps not 100K, but let's stop this "they work so hard" crap as if others don't.

Look at the bright side OP, after all is said and done, at least you can pay your bills. It sure would suck to have a DH working those hours and still be hungry at night.

I agree. If you go to the parts of the city that most DCUM wouldn't go near, you will see 24 hour day care centers. Single moms who work 2 jobs have to leave their precious babies there overnight. Why? Because they need to work that hard just to survive. Plenty of people in this world would kill to work in a big law firm and have all the perks and money that come along with it.

Anonymous wrote:This whole discussion is giving me real pause. I have a great opportunity to get back full time plus into the work force after working part-time for the last two years. It is a dream job, but DH is a big law partner and works long hours, and I am nervous about what this will do to our lives and our kids lives (have a baby and older kid).

From what I have observed (granted, it's a limited sample size), the biglaw partners married to wives with careers tend to have much more balanced lives than biglaw partners whose wives are SAH. I would speculate that there are several reasons for this: 1) their wives have work events that are non-negotiable, so DH has to step up to the childcare homeplate more often than their counterparts with SAH wives; 2) their marriages are more equitable, so DHs end up doing more childcare/home duties than their counterparts with SAH wives.

So long as your FT position allows you reasonable predictability and hours, I would try it.

Anonymous wrote:BTW, have any men in your firm asked you if you're looking forward to your three month vacation? Or "it must be nice to get a 12 week paid vacation." So funny. . . . My second favorite is when you were up all night with a sick child, raced into work early and ran around crazy to get home to get sick child to doc and someone (usually young male who arrived at work by 11 and then took 1.5 hours for lunch and workout) spots you leaving (at 4 or so) and has to say "Cutting out early for the day?" Fun times, really.

Absolutely! Or, arrive to work early and ditch the typically non-optional 2 hour group lunch/gossip session in order to leave early for a soccer game and get an eye roll and "must be nice!!!" on the way out the door. I saw a version of that happen to many female associates. Meanwhile, the men who dashed off to attend each and every one of their wife's prenatal appointment got a "what a stand-up guy" comment from more senior partners.

I don't know why I keep reading these posts because people are so judgmental and mean. I was the last one of my associate class to leave my BigLaw firm. It wasn't that we weren't prepared to work hard under intense pressure or that we weren't excited about the prospect of earning a lot of money. We just all came to the conclusion that the lifestyle of the BigLaw firm, in terms of face time, constantly being judged (personally) and the total lack of autonomy from associate through partner level would not work for us for various reasons. There are days when I miss the extra cash flow and the excitement of working on cutting edge issues, but I've made my choice and I don't regret it at all. I justify my decision not because my kids will love me better because I am home, but because I stood up for my personal values and am happy and grateful every day that I had chose to do it so I'm proud that my kids have me as a role model for whatever profession they chose (even law!). I am sure that there are many attorneys who have made peace with their firm politics and the demands of their lifestyle so can't we all just be happy for them as well? The only people that any of us should "feel sorry for" are those who truly feel trapped in their circumstances, for whatever reason. To the OP, I say if you are struggling, tell your husband and ask him to interview at some other firms. From these posts, it seems that there is a range of both partner hourly demands as well as salaries. It obviously depends on his area of law, but it's never too late to make a change that will make his family happier.

This whole discussion is giving me real pause. I have a great opportunity to get back full time plus into the work force after working part-time for the last two years. It is a dream job, but DH is a big law partner and works long hours, and I am nervous about what this will do to our lives and our kids lives (have a baby and older kid).

Anonymous wrote:I'm a BIGLAW partner (two years in), and I make $310 per year (which I'm starting to see is pathetic in comparison). I'm also the mom, pregnant with another on the way, but am working full time. Most of my colleagues are men, and not patient with women who have babies (though they pay lip service, it's mostly an inconvenience to them). But, I'm nonetheless home for breakfast and dinner most days, do child care pickup and drop off half the week, and sometimes work from home so I get to do wakeups from naps, etc. I also work in the evenings when necessary and on weekends, but generally from home--unless the project requires such concentration I need to be in the office. I'm present to my clients, and make myself available for calls, etc. with other partners, but not in the middle of dinner/bedtime--if for no other reason that it's too noisy!

Screw everyone who says that people who marry lawyers know what they're getting into. There's no way to know it until you live this life, and frankly, there are enough periods of downturn, because the economy stinks, or because a case settles, for example, that you really cannot generalize. The bottom line, seems to me, is that if you're not happy intrinsically with how your family spends time together, then you need to work on changing it. You don't need to accept the way of life you have if it doesn't work for you. But, and this is a fine choice too, you might decide that it works well enough for now given the financial security or your husband's happiness, and that you'll reexamine it later.

BTW, have any men in your firm asked you if you're looking forward to your three month vacation? Or "it must be nice to get a 12 week paid vacation." So funny. . . . My second favorite is when you were up all night with a sick child, raced into work early and ran around crazy to get home to get sick child to doc and someone (usually young male who arrived at work by 11 and then took 1.5 hours for lunch and workout) spots you leaving (at 4 or so) and has to say "Cutting out early for the day?" Fun times, really.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't pretend to have the answers, so I can't really judge. I think pretty much every situation is imperfect for the modern family and we do the best we can. Marriage with kids is really tough. It is hard to take care of the kids, the house and finances, ourselves, our marriage, and maybe other family members who need us.

I grew up with a CEO dad who worked and traveled insane hours. And then wanted time to unwind and play golf (which was also a business thing) and wanted time with his kids and wanted time with his wife. It was hard. My mom stayed home and took care of a lot. She admits now she was unhappy for a number of years, felt disconnected to my dad, etc., but they pulled through and it got better - now they are almost at 50 years of marriage, dad is retired, and they are best friends. And yes, the financial advantages were huge - no student loans, great vacations with family, and it's nice to have some security in case something happens (though we don't rely on my parent's money at all, other than letting them contribute a bit to college funds for grandkids and letting my mom buy clothes etc. when she wants to).

My marriage is different - we are both working and parenting. But still struggle to find time for each other and we have gone through phases where we are very disconnected. We do counseling which helps.

There are no perfect arrangements and circumstances dictate some things (your husband's field, yours, whether one parent wants to stay home, etc.). You just do the best you can and struggle throuhg tough times and enjoy the times that aren't so tough.

Good post.

I agree - very well said!

I'm a BIGLAW partner (two years in), and I make $310 per year (which I'm starting to see is pathetic in comparison). I'm also the mom, pregnant with another on the way, but am working full time. Most of my colleagues are men, and not patient with women who have babies (though they pay lip service, it's mostly an inconvenience to them). But, I'm nonetheless home for breakfast and dinner most days, do child care pickup and drop off half the week, and sometimes work from home so I get to do wakeups from naps, etc. I also work in the evenings when necessary and on weekends, but generally from home--unless the project requires such concentration I need to be in the office. I'm present to my clients, and make myself available for calls, etc. with other partners, but not in the middle of dinner/bedtime--if for no other reason that it's too noisy!

Screw everyone who says that people who marry lawyers know what they're getting into. There's no way to know it until you live this life, and frankly, there are enough periods of downturn, because the economy stinks, or because a case settles, for example, that you really cannot generalize. The bottom line, seems to me, is that if you're not happy intrinsically with how your family spends time together, then you need to work on changing it. You don't need to accept the way of life you have if it doesn't work for you. But, and this is a fine choice too, you might decide that it works well enough for now given the financial security or your husband's happiness, and that you'll reexamine it later.

Anonymous wrote:I don't pretend to have the answers, so I can't really judge. I think pretty much every situation is imperfect for the modern family and we do the best we can. Marriage with kids is really tough. It is hard to take care of the kids, the house and finances, ourselves, our marriage, and maybe other family members who need us.

I grew up with a CEO dad who worked and traveled insane hours. And then wanted time to unwind and play golf (which was also a business thing) and wanted time with his kids and wanted time with his wife. It was hard. My mom stayed home and took care of a lot. She admits now she was unhappy for a number of years, felt disconnected to my dad, etc., but they pulled through and it got better - now they are almost at 50 years of marriage, dad is retired, and they are best friends. And yes, the financial advantages were huge - no student loans, great vacations with family, and it's nice to have some security in case something happens (though we don't rely on my parent's money at all, other than letting them contribute a bit to college funds for grandkids and letting my mom buy clothes etc. when she wants to).

My marriage is different - we are both working and parenting. But still struggle to find time for each other and we have gone through phases where we are very disconnected. We do counseling which helps.

There are no perfect arrangements and circumstances dictate some things (your husband's field, yours, whether one parent wants to stay home, etc.). You just do the best you can and struggle throuhg tough times and enjoy the times that aren't so tough.

Good post.

Anonymous wrote:To the "unicorn" commenter at 9:24: Just because her DH is at the office from 9:30-6:30 (9 hrs -- which if he's efficient, means he can bill 8.25 - 8.5), doesn't mean that he doesn't bill a few more hours in the evenings after the kids go to sleep, or on the weekends. Remember, this game is all about billable hours -- provided that you're not in a firm/practice area that has alot of face time requirements.

Signed,
Biglaw Senior Associate who leaves before 6 most days (but still bills 2400 hrs+/yr)

Unicorn poster here. Yeah, but at my firm there is a big emphasis on face-time, regardless of how many hours you say you're billing from home. This totally would not fly. They want to SEE you billing your hours.

DH frequently works similar hours-- and he is a government prosecutor. I think he should go back to a firm, since at leat then we'd have the money to accompany those hours.

Regarding the notion that biglaw partners have autonomy, I can only say, "yeah, you'd think so." Here's two real life examples: I became a biglaw partner due to my expertise in a tiny and very important area of law. So when big shot partner's big time corporate client had this particular issue, they'd call me. I was fully occupied and well-paid with great work and brought none of it in on my own. While I had the ability to work around my kids' schedules a fair amount, I was not autonomous. DH, on the other hand became partner and soon had 100% his own bigtime corporate clients. He's been fully busy and extremely well compensated for 10 years answering to no one but the clients. Technically, he's autonomous because he has his own clients but really the clients can call 24/7 from anywhere in the world and DH doesn't control the court's calendar, of course. The far far more common scenario in biglaw is that an associate comes up through the ranks working for one or two bigtime partners working on their one or two bigtime clients. When associate becomes partner, his responsibilities with the clients and in the courtroom hopefully and presumably increase, not decrease. So, you can say you're "more autonomous" because you have one less lawyer layer above you or an extra lawyer layer below you but it doesn't hold much meaning in practice. It's still lots and lots of work. And if you don't somehow secure a bigtime client of your own by the time you're 45 or so, you're job isn't even secure.

Maybe if the wives of Biglaw attys didn't decide to SAH, there would be less pressure for them to put in face time?

What possible difference would that make? There are tons of people who are single, married with no kids, and married with kids that are willing to spend those sort of hours in the office, regardless of whether their spouse works.