Anonymous
Post 09/13/2025 13:58     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I did well in biglaw. Son is attending now. Entering Law, is, still the best upward mobility vehicle I know of aside from med school, which takes much longer. After clerking, he'll enter DC or New York firms making $246K or better. Yes, he knows how mindboggling boring it can be. He's heard it from me and all of my friends. Itis what it is. But it will get him set financially for life and after being an associate, he can find a better path should he want it. There are many other things that law graduates can do. Many


Only true if you get into T14. Otherwise you won’t even get an interview at most biglaw firms.


I can’t necessarily refute but I can anecdote and it seems that decent law schools in good legal markets are also strong feeders to BigLaw.

Know a girl at Fordham with offers from Latham and another big firm and she isn’t top of the class or law review or whatever. She says many in her class are also getting good offers.

Now, I doubt she would have many options if she wanted to go to SV, but it seems recruiting is strong in NYC.
Anonymous
Post 09/13/2025 13:04     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:I’ve always thought the people who go to T14 schools and then big law were smart, but couldn’t hack STEM. I think it’s still sought out by the people who want to make money but can’t do finance/medicine/software engineering.


I assume it's because people prefer it? I can't imagine being a doctor, for example. Couldnt' hack it? I dont know. I got all As in high school with the same top 1% as them. But 30 years later - I'm 100% happy I'm not a doctor. Or an engineer. Or a chemist working for some big pharmaceutical company. I did end up working for big tech, msft for first 20 years of my career, but that was more about the times I lived in. And an area that was super exciting from 1995 to 2025.
Anonymous
Post 09/13/2025 12:58     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I did well in biglaw. Son is attending now. Entering Law, is, still the best upward mobility vehicle I know of aside from med school, which takes much longer. After clerking, he'll enter DC or New York firms making $246K or better. Yes, he knows how mindboggling boring it can be. He's heard it from me and all of my friends. Itis what it is. But it will get him set financially for life and after being an associate, he can find a better path should he want it. There are many other things that law graduates can do. Many


Only true if you get into T14. Otherwise you won’t even get an interview at most biglaw firms.

True yet T14 is pretty easy to get from yop undergrad.
T14 is the most common destination for law from kids' ivy even averageish 3.8/Lsat 169 kids get into lower T14. Big5 is what the 3.9/171+ chase (Y, H, S, Penn, Chicago). Majority use ED to one of the T14, ivy advises it for most
Anonymous
Post 09/13/2025 08:17     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Their all being thretened by AI.


not true at all, AI can't practice law


No, but it can greatly reduce the number of associates needed. I’m a lawyer and use AI every day. It’s amazing how helpful it is.


My IP lawyer DH has been checking out specialized AI tools available for patent prosecution and he is flabbergasted by how good they are. Definitely game changing. Who needs an associate to draft a response when AI can do it for you in no time?


+1. Only a few lawyers are needed know that AI can analyze hundreds of cases in minutes.
Anonymous
Post 09/13/2025 08:06     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:I did well in biglaw. Son is attending now. Entering Law, is, still the best upward mobility vehicle I know of aside from med school, which takes much longer. After clerking, he'll enter DC or New York firms making $246K or better. Yes, he knows how mindboggling boring it can be. He's heard it from me and all of my friends. Itis what it is. But it will get him set financially for life and after being an associate, he can find a better path should he want it. There are many other things that law graduates can do. Many


Only true if you get into T14. Otherwise you won’t even get an interview at most biglaw firms.
Anonymous
Post 09/13/2025 08:00     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I did well in biglaw. Son is attending now. Entering Law, is, still the best upward mobility vehicle I know of aside from med school, which takes much longer. After clerking, he'll enter DC or New York firms making $246K or better. Yes, he knows how mindboggling boring it can be. He's heard it from me and all of my friends. Itis what it is. But it will get him set financially for life and after being an associate, he can find a better path should he want it. There are many other things that law graduates can do. Many


A law degree closes doors outside of law. Any business front office role you get with a JD could’ve been much more easily obtained before committing three years to rote study.



You could not be more wrong. Google “careers with a JD”.
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 22:32     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Law has always been popular for risk averse liberal arts majors.
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 22:04     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:Compared to 30 years ago, I think it's very true that there are comparatively few bright students interested in becoming lawyers today. Now, smart and ambitious students are much more likely to choose engineering, finance, pre-med, tech, and consulting.

People are much more informed today about the realities of being a lawyer. And neither the life nor the money seems that appealing to most. I think you really need to feel it as a vocation for it to make sense.


Agree! Very few of my daughter's Princeton class went to law school compared to consulting, IB and FinTech.
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 20:42     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:I did well in biglaw. Son is attending now. Entering Law, is, still the best upward mobility vehicle I know of aside from med school, which takes much longer. After clerking, he'll enter DC or New York firms making $246K or better. Yes, he knows how mindboggling boring it can be. He's heard it from me and all of my friends. Itis what it is. But it will get him set financially for life and after being an associate, he can find a better path should he want it. There are many other things that law graduates can do. Many


A law degree closes doors outside of law. Any business front office role you get with a JD could’ve been much more easily obtained before committing three years to rote study.
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 15:44     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
I did well in biglaw. Son is attending now. Entering Law, is, still the best upward mobility vehicle I know of aside from med school, which takes much longer. After clerking, he'll enter DC or New York firms making $246K or better. Yes, he knows how mindboggling boring it can be. He's heard it from me and all of my friends. Itis what it is. But it will get him set financially for life and after being an associate, he can find a better path should he want it. There are many other things that law graduates can do. Many
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 14:18     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:I would say that the current state of the justice system should be a big flag for anyone going into law...

what's the point in going to law school, working hard, learning so much if it just comes down to a judge thinking "What would Trump want me to do here?" and your boss at the law firm calculating he'd rather assign you to do free work filing class-action lawsuits against all residents of blue states for (allegedly) thinking about burning a flag, than fight back against Trump's attacks on the firm.


Who goes to law school thinking Trump will be in charge in 3 years?


And the vast, vast majority of lawyer work never faces a judge. It's mostly procedural.
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 14:14     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
I've done fine in big law and then small law in a transactional practice. I'm not sure I could've hacked it in tech, maybe finance. I would recommend finance to my younger self as it has more upside than law, and you don't have the opportunity cost of 3 years in law school in your twenties (although I imagine I would've gotten an MBA if I went to finance, so this might be moot).
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 14:08     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
I would say that the current state of the justice system should be a big flag for anyone going into law...

what's the point in going to law school, working hard, learning so much if it just comes down to a judge thinking "What would Trump want me to do here?" and your boss at the law firm calculating he'd rather assign you to do free work filing class-action lawsuits against all residents of blue states for (allegedly) thinking about burning a flag, than fight back against Trump's attacks on the firm.
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 14:04     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
Anonymous wrote:Seems like every high-achieving student is going into tech, finance, or consulting.

Back in the 1990's most of the smart kids aspired to Big Law.


Did you sleep through 2000s and 2010s?
Anonymous
Post 09/12/2025 14:01     Subject: is being a lawyer losing its appeal compared to tech or finance for high achieving students?
I’ve always thought the people who go to T14 schools and then big law were smart, but couldn’t hack STEM. I think it’s still sought out by the people who want to make money but can’t do finance/medicine/software engineering.