Hey, Ide...Law students sue law schools: "You sed I'd be able to get a job!"

[alfred russel]

I'd rage that this is a sign that our country is way too litigious, but that would seem doubly cruel to the unemployed law grads.

[The Minsky Moment]

This is kind of a funny response, because the principal allegation of the complaint is that the job placement rates are misleadingly calculated and reported.

What is it one of our grads was a law temp for a week so that counts?  Or does it even have to be legal work?

I don't know what the truth really is but the complaint alleges that they are counting things like non-legal temp work.  It  also alleges that the reported salary averages are based on a much smaller subet of people.

[CountDeMoney]

While I'm sympathetic to Ide and his plight, young people and their choice of higher education generally sucks.

Assholes going for their MBA straight out of undergrad need to floss their teeth with my ass hair.

[Ed Anger]

Huh.

I'm not picking on you Val. 

I know you weren't but I was totally agreeing with you

I could see getting a AAS in History at a community college. At ~100/credit hr, you could do that on pell grants alone.

Going to even a state school for 4 years+ for History? Pshaw. Silly.

[Valmy]

I don't know what the truth really is but the complaint alleges that they are counting things like non-legal temp work.  It  also alleges that the reported salary averages are based on a much smaller subet of people.

Well obviously if you are doing temp work you do not have a salary.  So in the glorious tradition of misleading statistics it is like:

Here is the total number of grads who are actually working (at all)

Here is the average salary (of our grads who actualy have salaried employment)

[Valmy]

I could see getting a AAS in History at a community college. At ~100/credit hr, you could do that on pell grants alone.

Going to even a state school for 4 years+ for History? Pshaw. Silly.

I was actually a Physics student I just took lots of HIstory for...um...stupidity?  But it turned out to be how I was able to leave school with both a degree and my sanity.  Of course the fact I was stupidly taking extra courses was the reason I was losing it in the first place.  I took a history course every semester just for a break from the math and science you see.

But in my defense people were always feeding me all this crap about getting a well rounded education or some BS when it should have been: get skills and get a job.

[The Minsky Moment]

Assholes going for their MBA straight out of undergrad need to floss their teeth with my ass hair.

I think the origin of that phenomenon was the boom in banking and finance.  The problem was that too many Ivy League high-fliers coming out of college didn't know how to use Excel or run a DCF analysis. 

[Iormlund]

I only ended up with it because I was too emo to finish my senior physics project

My life really has been nuts since that fateful year.  Too long in school had officially driven me insane.

I hated school so much that I quit after I started working.

[Phillip V]

I quit school after two years. 

[Maximus]

I started asking around to see what companies needed EE degreed peeps and man...I realized I have no idea WTF I am talking about or doing.  Fortunately I still have a couple years out before I have to do this in earnest.  We students really have no fucking idea...and worse we do not know we have no fucking idea until we actually start getting serious about employment.

Don't I know it. In my last semester and only now feel like I'm getting the picture. Man I wish I had taken some database courses now.

[Caliga]

Man I wish I had taken some database courses now.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I hear grumblings sometimes that going to law school isn't a very good investment.

The arguments I usually hear are that a small handful of prestigious law schools are responsible for the overwhelming majority of lawyers that end up making really good money, the rest end up making middle class ($45-80k) a year but with far higher student loan payments than many who can earn similar wages with only a bachelor's degree.

However, at least as I can tell that doesn't stand up to closer scrutiny. The BLS reports employment of attorneys is expected to increase 13% over the ten year period 2008-2018, which is about an average rate compared to other occupations. It reports the median income for attorneys in the United States is $110k which is solidly upper middle class, and while not what it used to be breaking six figures isn't easy for many who only have bachelor's degrees, even for accountants and engineers. Accountants median is $60k and with engineers it varies wildly based on type of engineering but none of the subcategories of engineering have median wages over $100,000. So the $110k median earning for an attorney is higher than the best paid jobs out there that require only a bachelor's degree. Since we're talking about median numbers, we also can't say that the numbers are skewed by the small cabal of ultra-wealthy lawyers who graduated highly ranked from the very best schools (since that defies how medians work.)

The only X factor is, the BLS doesn't seem to have good information (any?) on how many new law school graduates there are versus that 13% growth rate in open positions. Nor does it have figures on how many persons who graduate law school can expect to attain permanent, gainful employment as attorneys. Realistically considering the time, effort, and financial costs of going through law school that number better be damn near 100% or there's serious troubles with the value proposition.

[CountDeMoney]

The country would be much better off if there were less law school graduates and more humanities graduates.

[Ideologue]

The country would be much better off if there were less law school graduates and more humanities graduates.

[Martinus]

I hear grumblings sometimes that going to law school isn't a very good investment.

The arguments I usually hear are that a small handful of prestigious law schools are responsible for the overwhelming majority of lawyers that end up making really good money, the rest end up making middle class ($45-80k) a year but with far higher student loan payments than many who can earn similar wages with only a bachelor's degree.

However, at least as I can tell that doesn't stand up to closer scrutiny. The BLS reports employment of attorneys is expected to increase 13% over the ten year period 2008-2018, which is about an average rate compared to other occupations. It reports the median income for attorneys in the United States is $110k which is solidly upper middle class, and while not what it used to be breaking six figures isn't easy for many who only have bachelor's degrees, even for accountants and engineers. Accountants median is $60k and with engineers it varies wildly based on type of engineering but none of the subcategories of engineering have median wages over $100,000. So the $110k median earning for an attorney is higher than the best paid jobs out there that require only a bachelor's degree. Since we're talking about median numbers, we also can't say that the numbers are skewed by the small cabal of ultra-wealthy lawyers who graduated highly ranked from the very best schools (since that defies how medians work.)

The only X factor is, the BLS doesn't seem to have good information (any?) on how many new law school graduates there are versus that 13% growth rate in open positions. Nor does it have figures on how many persons who graduate law school can expect to attain permanent, gainful employment as attorneys. Realistically considering the time, effort, and financial costs of going through law school that number better be damn near 100% or there's serious troubles with the value proposition.

The last paragraph of your post imo hits the nail on its head. From anecdotal evidence, many many more law graduates end up working in jobs that are only remotely related to legal work than is the case for, say, accountants or engineers. Many end up working as clerks, public employees, paralegals and the like. Or politicians.

Also, I don't know about cost, but my impression is that time and effort needed to get a law degree is significantly lower than getting a medical or engineer degree.