Wednesday, May 16, 2012

The graduates

In the past few weeks I've heard from three different people who are in some variation of this scenario:

A law school applicant graduated from college a year ago and has either been working at a low-wage low status job or has been volunteering for a social service organization.  The applicant has been offered partial "scholarships" (cross-subsidized tuition breaks) to low-ranked law schools or could attend a higher-ranked but not elite school at sticker or close to sticker.

The parents are putting major pressure on applicant to enroll, by offering some financial support, such as promising to cover the applicant's living expenses while in law school, or offering to make the applicant's loan payments for a year or two after graduation.

The applicant has done some research and realizes the available options don't look good, but either doesn't want to alienate the parents and/or wants the offered financial support.  In each instance the applicant has tried to convince the parents that the wise thing to do under the circumstances is to re-take the LSAT and try to get better offers in the next admissions cycle, but the parents are rejecting this idea.

In all these cases I've been struck by the extent to which some type of status anxiety seems to be driving the parents' actions.  Two are from upwardly mobile professional class families which emigrated to the US in the previous generation.  The third has a parent who has had a successful legal career (but apparently will not be in a position to exercise much if anything in the way of nepotistic influence).

All these kids -- and they are kids, none of them have really done much of anything besides go to school -- are getting some version of the message that their parents are frustrated by what they perceive as post-college drift, and are impatient to see their children take on the respectable professional identities that they were sent to school (no doubt at considerable expense) to acquire.

It appears the parents simply don't believe what their children tell them about what has happened to the relative value of a law degree. This is especially a problem for the child of the lawyer, who graduated from law school 25 years ago from a state law school after paying a total of $7,000 over three years in tuition.  This parent claims to have "struggled" to get a job, which turns out to mean the parent had to work for two years at a legal job the parent didn't really want before getting the kind of job the parent had gone to school to acquire.

In short, the parents refuse to accept that in America today it's perfectly possible for people from relatively privileged upper middle class backgrounds to follow all the rules, do everything right, and still end up with a series of bad options. It's almost as if that's unconstitutional or something.  They push their child to make what is likely to turn out to be an irreversibly bad choice in the long run, so that at least in the short run they can say their child is going to be something that still sounds like a good thing to be.



100 comments:

  1. It's a baby boomer upper middle class phenomenon. That is why everyone under 35 absolutely loathes boomers with the same passion normally reserved for dangerous criminals.

    The parents are spoiled and delusional. They've never known hardship or adversity in any meaningful sense.

    Young people can see the writing on he wall and are more world-wise to the current state of things than are their parents. They see what their peers and their slightly older friends are going through.

    Just wait until the young tell the oldies that we can't afford to pay on the retirement benefits that they promised themselves. It will rival whining this country hasn't seen since disappointment over the color of hula hoop that Santa supplied to the same brat in 1959.

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  2. A university librarian told me the other day that her son had enrolled in a third tier law school with a full scholarship. She was proud that he would be studying international law and that her support for his degree would someday pay off when she was old and retired. After all, he does have living expenses and some loans were taken out for miscellaneous expenses (no reason for austerity measures when your a law student am I right?) It doesn't matter the cost she said, lawyers pay it off within no time. I'm stunned when meeting educated middle class academics that recite this prosperity doctrine with such confidence. She went to ask what I was doing. I told her retail management. She said that I should throw in the towel and go to law school. Not gonna happen.

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  3. The old gutting the prospects of the young is not a new phenomenon.

    http://www.esquire.com/features/young-people-in-the-recession-0412

    The fascinating difference with the examples that LawProf gave is that the older parents don't even realize that they did it.

    "What do you mean you don't have opportunity!? Have you tried networking!?"

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  4. While I agree with the poster at 6:35, I think it is a bad idea to lay this at the feet of the Baby Boomers. As a general rule, most are clueless on this topic but at the same time, the Gen Xers and the Yers need them in order to solve this problem. Keep in mind, there are many Boomers who are deadbeats and who only care about themselves but there are some who understand this problem and readily admit (like my Baby Boomer parents) that they projected their success onto me...and were wrong in doing so. Some Baby Boomer parents will admit that times are different now.

    The powers that be want division. Blaming the Baby Boomers will do nothing to solve this problem. We know who to blame, lets move forward with some solutions.

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  5. This. A million times this. Thanks for getting it, Campos.

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  6. Wait until Boomer Mom and Dad check out the (completely farcical) employment data published by the Third Tier diploma mill that their millennial has already been admitted to. $95,000 average salary will really get the parents to apply the pressure.

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  7. "All these kids -- and they are kids, none of them have really done much of anything besides go to school -- are getting some version of the message that their parents are frustrated by what they perceive as post-college drift, and are impatient to see their children take on the respectable professional identities that they were sent to school (no doubt at considerable expense) to acquire."

    The thing is, post-university drift is by far the most profitable way of going. Eventually you'll find some niche, just so long as you don't gernuinely become what the Japanese call a hikikomori and keep on the look-out for something. Jobs are scarce, yes, but it's a big planet.

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  8. Prof. Campos, thanks for this blog. I'm one of those baby boomer lawyers who went to a state school, for a total of $800 in tuition, and graduated 30+ years ago. After a slow start (anybody remember..or hear of.. CETA?) I had a very good career. With luck, I discovered the law school scamblogs when my son was a senior in college, and short circuited any plans he may have had to go to law school. He's still figuring out what to do next, but he has no debt. I'm considering ending my financial contributions to my law school, even though it is not one of the really bad guys. So some of us boomers do get it, and we try to spread the word.

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    Replies
    1. 705 is a rare boomer who was educated over the internet. Most boomers watch television. Campos need to get on tv as much as possible as the boomers will effect their kids decisions...then watch how the law school industry crumbles

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  9. Would you feel better if the parents pushed the kids to go into the military?

    Sometimes parents are just pushing the kids to do something -- anything -- with their lives.

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  10. Clueless boomer tropes:

    1) "Why don't you try to get a foot in door with an internship?" (key to the trope: when in the past has it been necessary to work for an extended time for free with no promise whatsoever of a job? If they can't pay you now, why would they do so in future?)

    2) "Try networking" (key to the trope: how will this help if everyone does it? Who will listen? People find jobs through connections, not networking per se)

    3) "More school" (key to the trope: If you can't get a job now, what difference will more time spent studying non/barely-work related subjects make?)

    any additions?

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  11. FOARP:

    The world always needs more good Xs.

    People with advanced degrees make on average X more than those without them over the course of a career.

    STEM!

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  12. FOARP:

    4. "Everyone struggles at first." (key implication is that it will all be sunshine and rainbows in short order, which ignores the long term trends).

    5. "Law is a versatile degree. You can do lots of things with it." (key is that you not ask the obvious follow up question: "like what?" Law school does not enable you to do anything besides practice law, and it does not even train you how to do that).

    6. "Law school will teach you how to think like a lawyer." (key is that you do not ask what this actually means. What does it mean? I always kind of viewed it as ju jutsu when people accuse law of being worthless. Ah, but we train you how to think like a lawyer. It is meaningless drivel and no professor actually knows how to think like a lawyer.)

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  13. So you're telling me a 22 year old needs the *permission*/*blessing* of his/her parents in making major life decisions?

    What the fuck is wrong with my generation? You're AT LEAST 22. If you don't want to go to law school, DONT GO.

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  14. People with advanced degrees make on average X more than those without them over the course of a career.

    Disclaimers:

    past performance does not guarantee future results.

    Correlation does not equal causation.

    General statements are true generally.

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  15. 7) Doesn't matter what school you get into or the grades you receive after your first job.

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  16. "All these kids -- and they are kids, none of them have really done much of anything besides go to school."

    You nailed it. Of course, corporate bagman Melvin SchweiTTTzer of the New York State Supreme Court believes - or pretends to believe - that all college grads are "sophisticated consumers."

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  17. 8. Does not matter how much debt you accrue, you will pay it off fast.

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  18. @7.48 - Yeah, back in the UK I even used to believe that one until I noticed that people were actually getting turned away from some companies (e.g., KPMG, Accenture and others) based on the results of exams they took when they were 16 years old.

    Well, if this is becoming a clueless academic thing, let's go with:

    8) "We train warrior-citizens!" (KtT: No, you don't. If I wanted to become a 'warrior-citizen', I would have joined the army)

    9) "Our degrees are priceless!" (KtT: close, but no cigar)

    10)"Knowing Chinese/space law/[insert post-grad field of studies here] is key to succeeding in our modern economy" (KtT: the person giving this advice prefers to teach rather than use their knowledge which they say is so valuable. If you are interested in these things and can afford to do so, go ahead, but don't count on them getting you a job)

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  19. 9. Student loans are "good debt"!

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  20. 11) When I went to school, it was $500.00 a year, I had loans fixed at 2% and I paid them off in three years. Student loan debt is GOOD DEBT. It is an investment in yourself.

    FFFFUUUUUUCCCCCCKKKKKKK

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  21. 12) We pick ourselves up by our bootstraps when times are rough. Why don't you have a job?

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  22. For Christ's sake.

    Here's something to hit your parents with, children whose parents demand that they become attorneys.

    Subway franchisees have to pay $15,000 for a franchise fee, and then 12.5% of gross sales minus sales tax thereafter. The franchisee has to find a contractor to build his restaurant, but Subway negotiates the lease and then subleases it to him. For less than 15% of what a T1 legal education will cost most of its graduates, you can start a small business. If you're a total failure at it, Chapter 7 or 11 will wipe it clean. Being a failed small business owner also won't cause future employers to wonder what's wrong with you, the way a JD sans legal experience often does.

    I promise you that it's easier and more profitable to sell sandwiches than it is to sell legal services, almost anywhere in America.

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  23. 13) When I was your age, nobody helped me. I did it all myself. Your generation is spoiled and entitled. Why don't you start a business?

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  24. 14) You paid all this money for a degree, cannot find a job but just remember, you have SOMETHING and something is better than nothing.

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  25. 15. Just be patient! Something will turn up.

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  26. 15) (corrolarly to 14) "Studying X at [insert toilet school here] is better than doing nothing"

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  27. 15. My degree did not prepare me for the workforce either but I learned how to become competent while on the job.

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  28. 16. Having a part-time 20 hour a week job at 10.00 per hour with no benefits will allow you to get your foot in the door. You can always move up. If that does not work, find a second part-time job.

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  29. 17. "Can't find a job? Well [insert name of person with familial connection that helped him/her get into their position] is doing alright"

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  30. 7:56:

    Have you ever spoken to somebody who was a Subway franchisee? They are miserable. 60 hour weeks for 40K a year. Your promise is a lie. I looked into it and actually SPOKE to people who have done it. They were more adamant about running in the other direction than Biglaw associates.

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  31. 18. The best time to go to buy anything is when everyone else is selling. - Prof. Seto.

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  32. 19. The economy will improve. This is just a temporary glitch in hiring. By the time you graduate in 2010, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15....everything will be ok. -Law school shills.

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  33. @8:10 a.m.:

    As long as it's +$40k a year and not -$40k a year, it's still a better deal than almost any American law school at anything near sticker price.

    You can graduate from law school, work 60-hour weeks and make $40k a year - with $150k in debt appreciating at 7.5%. I'm not saying that being a Subway franchisee is a golden ticket, merely that it costs less than (and is likely to return as much as) most new law careers will.

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  34. In the past, and among other places, I tried to get a job at: Enterprise Rent A Car, Burger King as a Manager, McDonald's as a Manager, Sherwin Williams Paint Store as a Manager, Cablevision, Verizon, An oil Refinery, Law Firms, Many Insurance companies, Paralegal Placeent agencys, Insrance Industry Placement Agencys for positions such as claims, underwriting, administration, Bank Teller jobs, The Long Island power Authority or LIPA, Publishers Clearing House, Pall Corporation, Through a corporate placement agency called: "The Ladders"

    Monster.com postings, Carreerbuilder.com postings, NY Times Clasified postings.

    And on and on, and all with the JD on my resume. Most of these jobs were for non lawyer or non-legal positions.

    And one last note: Don't no one go talking bad about Ann Coulter. I am very fond of her and she is a good egg.

    She even wrote back to me after I posted on her chat room about the scamblogs.

    She only kicked me off her chat room when I wrote in reply that I wanted to read poetry to her and watch her big baby eyes change from bemused turquoise to radiant deep, blue sapphires in the light of the setting sun.

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  35. Fine. My issue with your post was that you made it sound like an easy solution to a rather complex problem. Your solution is not as easy as you made it seem. The tone of your first post suggested that it was such an obvious answer and anyone who did not see it was a fool. The clarification in your second post at least paints a clearer picture of your POV.

    Again, I have talked to people who have gone that route. You can see the defeat in their eyes. Its not like you stop working 60 hour weeks after a few years. It never ends.

    Interestingly enough, a person needs to borrow money to do it if family money is unavailable. Again, which loans are easier to get at 18 or 22 with no credit history: school loans or a small business loan?

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  36. 8:45 here. I was addressing 8:28.

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  37. I think if student are actually going thru the scenario that Law Prof offers above and I imagine they are. That the student needs to turn the parents on to these blogs and let them get educated. As a parent of a Lawyer (2011) graduate, if I would have known what I know now, I probably would have told him to run the other way. However, he wanted to be an attorney, did excellent in school (cum laude) and picked up a good job with a mid-sized firm. Am I concerned about his debt, you bet I am. Am I a boomer, yes! Am I concerned about fradulent activity by Law Schools and their administrators, You bet your ass I am. It's just the tip of corruption that is pervasive in American society as a whole. I think the young kids need to start protesting, riot if you have to..That will wake the bastards up..

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  38. 8:49 -- Sharpen the pitchforks for the boomers! Get your torches ready.

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  39. Something I never see talked about whenever it's mentioned that young people need to get out there and riot is the fact that young people these days are all doped up on antidepressants. Would the social movements of the 1960s and 1970s happened if baby boomers had all been on xanax, cymbalta, and depakote, like kids today are? As it has been mentioned here many times, law school is a mental illness factory and it only contributes to this problem. It is hard to find motivation to get out there and protest if you can't even find the motivation to get out of bed. We are all too medicated.

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  40. Baby boomer parents seem to be Control Freaks. Echo boomers are doormats allowing their parents to tell them what to do.

    Today echo boomers have to go to school longer, take additional standardized test, and jump through more pointless hoops.

    People tend to forget that NASA (and other aerospace companies) hired and allowed people with AA degrees work on the Space Shuttle until the 1980s. Good luck getting a job as a janitor at NASA with an AA degree today.

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  41. Would the social movements of the 1960s and 1970s happened if baby boomers had all been on xanax, cymbalta, and depakote, like kids today are?

    Excellent point. Citalopram is the only thing keeping me at my desk. Smiling with the invisible gun to my head. Dragging my corpse though another day.

    It's like soma in brave new world. The delta's are rioting, spray the aerosol soma.

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  42. The worst is the "carrot/stick" lawprof mentioned. It takes the form of "go to law school and we'll pay living expenses (so back to college for three years). Don't go to law school and you are out on the street."

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  43. 18. "Don't worry about the money. Just follow your dreams, and something good is guaranteed to come your way!"

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  44. I can't wait to watch the slow motion trainwreck that will be entitlement reform. It won't start for at least another year.

    By then, maybe the millenials will wake up and realize that they've been sold into slavery by mom and dad.

    If I hear any more of this, "we can't touch benefits for anyone over 55" business, I think I'll lose my mind. Why the hell not? You're the reason we have $16 TRILLION in public debt. Seems only fair to ask you to pony up something, like your retirement wages or medicare.

    Why should our nation subsidize the elderly at the expense of the young? I mean, I could understand it if we were rolling in it, but we're no longer a wealthy country.

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  45. 9:04: Right there with you. I'm off the meds these days but I feel that they really messed with my brain, permanently changed my chemistry or something. I haven't felt right since. It is sad, frustrating, and humiliating, all at once. Something that has really helped me is just to focus as much as I can on the present day, and try to not let my mind wander into the past or future, where there are regrets. Good luck to you.

    - 8:55

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  46. 19. If you do what you love, the money will come.

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  47. I have a real problem with this broad brush, "anti-boomer" rhetoric. It belies an unawareness/ignorance of class differences and is most unhelpful.

    The vast majority of baby boomers are not members of the professional class or upper middle class. While baby boomers in those groups profited immensely from low/no-cost public higher education and a different job market, most working class baby boomers have suffered greatly at the hands of globalization, off-shoring, and neoliberal economic policies.

    Think about the tens of thousands of "boomers" who lost everything with the demise of the textile industry in the Carolinas, the collapse of the steel industry in the Mahoning Valley of Ohio, etc. These folks played by the rules by paying taxes and in some cases serving in Vietnam, only to have the "rules" changed on them in the prime of their working lives. Condemned to never again earn in real, inflation adjusted dollars what they had as 30-sometings in the early 1980s.

    There is a book, documentary, or at least a doctoral thesis in the 1982 closure of Bethlehem Steel's Lackawanna, NY steel plant - 30 years ago this coming Christmas! Thousands - many of them boomers - thrown out of work overnight at just one plant. What became of them? How many ever again earned comparable salaries (in real dollars)? What prospects did their children have?

    These are serious questions and we obscure them with the idiotic assertion that all "baby boomers" are members of the professional and upper middle classes. Most "boomers" are struggling in their own ways and have no pension or savings for retirement. The fact that roughly 1/2 of recent social security eligibles have to start collecting their checks at age 62 underscores the plight of working class baby boomers and how that as Americans most of us are in the same predicament.

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  48. A codicil...

    The ruling class wants nothing more than for those struggling in this rigged economy to fight amongst themselves. "Divide and Conquer" is the strategy and Scott Walker said it himself - on tape no less.

    By whipping "baby boomers" as a group, rather than the 15-20% of them who made it into the professional and upper middle classes, is just pure folly.

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  49. @ 9:14:

    Thank you for a great post.

    I personally love to hate on Boomer attorneys, because they are so ridiculous and clueless and just horrible, but your post is an excellent one and a good reminder that this terrible economic pain we're seeing is not limited to the young in our society (although they are most of the ones taking it up the ass with the higher education scam).

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  50. Voodoo94,

    And what of the working class young now? Boomers have had it very good, albeit some more than others.

    Poor and working class boomers had/have a very good safety net. Visit anywhere in the developing world (or even most of europe) to see how the working class really lives.

    That cannot and will not continue in the U.S. because of all the debt that this nation piled on from approximately 1970 to the present.

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  51. @8:49-- you aren't the only one with pitchforks...

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  52. I think I missed being boomer by one or two years. What is the cut off? 1963?

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  53. 20. "Just look at Indiana Tech's Law School Feasibility Study (http://www.indianatech.edu/Academics/Documents/Law-School-Feasibility.pdf). There's a shortage of attorneys in many states, especially Indiana. That shortage equals demand. You will certainly be able to find legal work in one of those states."

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  54. 21. Your degree may be worthless and you may be in high debt with no job, but at least you are educated.

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  55. 10:04 -- agreed.

    I think when SHTF and the money really gets tight, boomers are going to have a really hard time adjusting to their riches to rags status.

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  56. "The parents are putting major pressure on applicant to enroll, by offering some financial support, such as promising to cover the applicant's living expenses while in law school, or offering to make the applicant's loan payments for a year or two after graduation."

    No deal mom. If you want sonny to have a fancy JD by his name, YOU NEED TO PUT UP THE TUITION CASH UP FRONT.

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  57. “Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure that you are not, in fact, just surrounded by assholes.”

    ― William Gibson

    That quote will get you to quit prozac or big pharma's soma

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  58. "It appears the parents simply don't believe what their children tell them about what has happened to the relative value of a law degree."

    Maybe they simply do not want their son to grow up to be a crack addicted homeless person who has to suck herpes infected penises for a few bucks.

    Say what you want about post-law school misery but sitting around all day posting on blogs and working shitty jobs under debt still beats the former scenario.

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  59. Thanks for posting this, Lawprof.

    I first hit the previous-generation dumbass wall when I was drifting after undergrad in 2007. I was talking to a parent and an old friend of theirs about why I was stuck working a shitty cash-in-hand job for 20 hours a week and the friend said 'oh, you should go to [Such-and-Such Temp Agency], they'll get you a job.' I had to explain that I'd been there, twice, and they wouldn't even take my resume because I didn't have any of the right kind of work experience, and the same was true of most other agencies not just in our area but in our entire city. This fact just *did not register* with them. They did not understand that the there was no entry-level work for college grads in our city. I guess they were equally dumbfounded when the economy went into recession a few months later.

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  60. 11:41:

    Seems a little extreme. You may want to keep your black and white thinking in check. It is the sign of a person with a low IQ.

    Just because someone decides that education is not the best course for them does not mean they will wind up in your fucked up scenario. Just because parents push education, does not mean that they envision your scenario for their kids.

    Calm down, breathe, and talk to someone. You sound like the asshole Gibson described at 11:40 AM.

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  61. It's called the worst case scenario 11:51. Why do you get to look at the worst case scenario of going to law school, but others are not allowed to look at the worst case scenario of not going to law school?

    It takes a particularly stupid person to criticize others for the exact same thought process that they advocate themselves!

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  62. 12.01 - I don't know what version of this blog you've been reading, but I guess you haven't noticed that what people are concerned about is not the 'worst case scenario of going to law school'. It's the average outcome for a normal law school graduate that we're looking upon with horror.

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  63. So, assuming that enough info is out there for the 0Ls to know LS is a poor investment choice (after all, now at least some of them are trying to convince their parents how poor of an investment choice it is), when one (or all three) of these students enroll anyway, who/what are you going to blame?

    It can't be the lack of info/transparency. It can't be that the young aren't "sophisticated consumers." So what then?

    The only answer is to close schools, and as long as people are still lining up to pay, it's gonna be a long, slow bleed and the "profession" is never going to turn around. And the debtors, well maybe there will only be 35,000 new ones each year instead of 45,000 after a decade or two.

    Where does this lead the "movement"?

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  64. 12:01:

    ?Huh?

    1) There are many examples that could be as bad as the one you described, if not worse.
    2) You only illustrated a worse case scenario in your posting.
    3) You used this scenario without qualifying it. It leads the reader to believe that this singular scenario is guiding the thought process of so many Americans which is why they are advising their kids to take out these predatory loans with bad employment prospects.
    4) The reader is also led to believe that, using your posting as a guide, there is no other alternative aside from two choices you described.

    You sound stupid. I hope you don't vote. If you do, please do me, my family, and my country a favor: don't vote in November, 2012.

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  65. Occam once said that a theory, when proposed, which requires the fewest assumptions is usually the right theory. Put another way: the simplest answer is usually the correct answer.

    Could it be that the reason why Baby Boomers have advised/encouraged/brainwashed their kids to seek higher education is simply because getting an education worked for them?

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  66. In short, the parents refuse to accept that in America today it's perfectly possible for people from relatively privileged upper middle class backgrounds to follow all the rules, do everything right, and still end up with a series of bad options. It's almost as if that's unconstitutional or something.

    That's gotta violate Due Process, provided that we are talking about a public law school.

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  67. It's easy to scapegoat the boomers, but they are as much victims as todays's students. Wages in general have remained stagnant since 1974. Lawyer's income, in contrast, has collapsed. http://insidethelawschoolscam.blogspot.com/2012/04/average-income-of-experienced-attorneys.html#comment-form

    Also, boomers have probably a harder time finding work in this economy than a new graduate. For the most part, we are unwilling to work the 60 hours a week demanded by most firms, Quite frankly, anyone who has practiced for 20 years or more absolutely hates it. Existing employers know this and would much rather "mold" a new attorney (i.e. fill their heads with all sorts of crap.)

    For the most part, the only boomers who are doing OK, at least those that I know, are those who "inherited" their practice from an attorney parent, or who have become judges.

    As is the case with any new business, starting a law practice usually means losing money for at least the first three years.

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  68. LawProf--I'm told the kids these days are using the term "bernankified" to describe being weighed down with federally-guaranteed loans.
    Just FYI.

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  69. "It's the average outcome for a normal law school graduate that we're looking upon with horror."

    Yes the average law school gradaute is unemployed. LOL. Dumbass. Only in extreme cases would a law school graduate not be able to find any job. shut the hell up with your lies.

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  70. "LawProf--I'm told the kids these days are using the term "bernankified" to describe being weighed down with federally-guaranteed loans. "

    Shut the fuck up with your dumb meme. Go spread it in your WOW clan.

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  71. @ 12:55:

    "It's the average outcome for a normal law school graduate that we're looking upon with horror."

    Did the poster say that the average outcome was unemployed?

    You must have done very well on the LSAT.

    "It's a Jump . . . to conclusions mat."

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  72. if you have jobs then what are you complaining about?

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  73. We do? Did you ask all of us? I don't remember getting a phone call or email. Did you send a smoke signal?

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  74. @ 11:41am

    Getting a law degree, especially from lowly regarded, open admission ones, does not preclude being in a "fucked up" scenario. I don't know why you or anyone would think that. Nothing about getting a JD prevents someone from having a messed up life. In fact the huge debt burden coupled with lack of being able to get a job that can service that debt would tend to make someone more messed up than if that same person didn't go to law school in the first place.

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  75. The Baby Boomers gave us John Lennon, and Woodstock, and the Hippies and the Counterculture.

    The Baby Boomers changed Humanity and worldwide Human Culture for the best, and made the world more humane and kind and sharing and giving.

    As pete Towensend said once about Janis Joplin and Hendrix:

    "They were your idols, but they were my Fucking friends!"

    And as John Lennon said: "All you need is (baby boomer) Love!

    Peace, and Love, and Usury.

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  76. "Nothing about getting a JD prevents someone from having a messed up life. In fact the huge debt burden coupled with lack of being able to get a job that can service that debt would tend to make someone more messed up than if that same person didn't go to law school in the first place."

    Again, what's better - being angry and commenting on blogs all day, or sucking herpetic penis to satisfy your crack cocaine addiction while not having a home?

    Life could be worse.

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  77. Neither Lennon nor Hendrix were boomers. Joplin and Townshend probably aren't either, but that depends on when you start counting.

    Anyway, it's not that uncommon for a generation's early heroes and leaders to be outside of that age group.

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  78. "Again, what's better - being angry and commenting on blogs all day, or sucking herpetic penis to satisfy your crack cocaine addiction while not having a home?

    Life could be worse."

    You are stupid and clearly have learned nothing from the discussion here. Like a wise person once said, "You never need to hang a bell around a fool's neck."

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  79. Shark Manwich:

    "Baby Boomer" is a loose cultural term, and not so much hard dates of birth. Check out Wikipedia.

    But the boomer heroes were without question the beatles, and hendrix, and Joplin, and The Who and etc.

    But in reality the whole counterculture was driven by big business, perhaps best represented by Mick Jagger of whom the late Philosphy Professor Allan Bloom described as, and in so many words: A teenage satyr, and shrewd middle class boy with one eye winking at his corporate backers ant the other at his audience that he whipped into a frenzy.

    And that was what the counterculture was all about. Making money and turning any little thing into mass distribution and commodity business.

    Case in point: Mick Jagger and Madonna sing at the superbowl as thousands that are drowning in student loan debt watch.

    It all sounds like madness maybe, but if you think about it, I will let you fill in the gaps, which is what creative writers do.

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  80. Sure, it is loose, that's why I said that Pete and Janis could be considered boomers. But the baby boom is generally considered a post-war thing, so it isn't a stretch to say that Hendrix and Lennon aren't boomers.

    Anyway, you won't get any argument from me that the counterculture was a moneymaking thing. Whether or not it started out as one or became one is a different question.

    But none of that is really within in the scope of this blog, so I'll see you at lawprof's next post.

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  81. I saw this a lot when I told my friends I was going to drop out of law school. Many echoed sentiments that they wish they could do the same thing but their parents wouldn't let them (even though they weren't financially dependent on their parents). There is massive societal/familial pressure not to drop out.

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  82. There are those of us baby boomers who went to top schools and whose kids SAW how risky and difficult being a lawyer really is. I did not have to tell my kids not to go to law school. They knew not to go to law school after growing up with me never home for dinner, working around the clock, working many weekends, in unstable jobs most of whidh lasted only a few years for me and for my peers, never really knowing what is going to happen next in terms of job security. Many of my top top law school classmates are underemployed or unemployed and have been for a long time. No, my kids did not like instability and poor prospects, and would not even consider law school. I did not have to tell them and would not let them go to law school, even if it was free. Simply too risky a proposition today.

    That being said, if you do not go to professional school, it may take a while -like 20 or 25 years - to make a decent amount of money. Doing any type of fairly menial job can get you experience where you may actually learn a skill that puts you into your own business. That is the best way to go. You may be a handyman, for example, and use your meager earnings to buy up depressed real estate. You keep adding to it, and by the time you are 55, you are rich. But from ages 22 to 42 you were a handyman with one or two pieces of real estate worth nothing and you were slaving away. That is the way it worked in my parents generation, and many of them came out a lot better, at least financially, than today's educated boomer class.

    Don't assume because you are serving lattes at Starbucks that you will never have your own very profitable handful of coffee restaurants.

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  83. Real Estate is NOT the way to get rich. The profits from the late 90's and early 00's were a phenomenon of an artificial, FRAUDULENT, bubble, rather than true economic growth. I guess you can make money off of renting but I doubt you'd get filthy rich.

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  84. Last week, a junior partner at the firm told me that his brother had made a plea for him to hire his son (partner's nephew) as an associate since he was graduating next week. His reply: "I can't even hire my own son, what makes you think I can hire Mikey?"

    This profession is getting so bad that even nepotism isn't a sure thing anymore.

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  85. Law firms are VERY VIGILANT for nepotism. It's not a joke or a something to take lightly. Due to the lack of jobs everyone is trying to shove their piece of shit relative into an associate position, but if you allow it you hurt the firm.

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  86. To the moron who keeps writing about how people who do not go to law school risk having to blow herpetic peni for crack money, YOU CAN'T GET ORAL HERPES FROM CONTACT WITH GENITAL HERPES, DUMBASS. That's why one is called Herpes 1 and the other is Herpes 2. Genital herpes can transfer to the genitals with contact. Oral herpes can transfer to the mouth from contact. But gentital herpes doesn't transfer to the mouth. People are so stupid.

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  87. @ May 16, 5:25PM wrote:

    "Don't assume because you are serving lattes at Starbucks that you will never have your own very profitable handful of coffee restaurants."

    That is, if the student loan debt doesn't get in the way or out of control to where it ruins the credit score.

    The Debt can do that by creating a condition where there are "excessive obligations in relation to income"

    Which is a banking term and stated ground for rejecting an application for a car loan, credit card loan, store credit, small business loan etc.

    But if none of that happens, then yes, the person working at Starbucks could potentially end up with a chain of coffee shops.

    And as far as the baby boomers go, I LOVE poking fun at the hypocrisy of that generation and the counterculture, which they thought was going to save the world and instead ran Higher Education into the ground with a cool trillion dollars of debt.

    Moreover, the Humanities are devalued, and generally viewed as a waste of time as so many commenters on this and many other blogs have expressed.

    The only problem with that is it creates a society with only the commercial and pop culture to inform it.

    As Philosophy Professor Allan Bloom said: 'Certain questions need to be answered by Hegel, and not Joyce Brothers"

    And not John Lennon.

    (This is so much fun!)

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  88. lulz. Baby Boomer Parents: The Gift That Keeps on Taking.

    Is there no end to the lengths these people will go to eat their young?

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  90. Skechers shoes has to pay $40 MILLION for a harmless deception, if we can call it a deception, and law schools get away with blatantly lying to destroy young people's lives.

    Can anyone explain this lack of proportion?

    http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2012/05/consumerrefund.shtm

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  91. Clueless boomer tropes:

    We have a knowledge economy and we need workers who are smart and flexible; in order to get the job you have to have a specific degree (adv degree preferred) and a specific number of years of relevant experience.

    (Key: you can't be flexible and a specialist at the same time)

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  92. Don't sell the boomers sneakers that (if they actually use them to exercise and eat right) might reduce their weight, because they'll expect the weight to melt off simply from wearing the sneaker and when it doesn't, you're in for $40 million of pain!

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  93. Look, the members of the class might have gone into almost $200 of debt dischargeable in bankruptcy to get those sneakers. Show some humanity.

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  94. Those shoes sell for like $50.

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  95. @6:06 - because Skechers made a specific claim about expected outcomes, while sophisticated law schools couch their 'warranties' in language that, so far, is being construed as not guaranteeing anything. Also, the outcomes for the Skechers product are much easier to measure than the 'guarantees' law schools engage in.

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  96. Are you being sarcastic 8:30?

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