Following up on yesterday's post, 'Right Now Is the Worst Time in History to be Graduating From Law School': in today's Wall Street Journal, Bar Raised for Law-Grad Jobs: Employment Prospects Dim as Firms Retrench, Derailing Career Paths for Many, by Nathan Koppel:

40,000 law-school students [will] graduate this spring and enter one of the worst job markets for attorneys in decades. This year's classes have it particularly bad, according to lawyers and industry experts. Though hiring was down last year as well, they said 2009 graduates applied for jobs before law firms had felt the full brunt of the downturn.

The situation is so bleak that some students and industry experts are rethinking the value of a law degree, long considered a ticket to financial security. If students performed well, particularly at top-tier law schools, they could count on jobs at corporate firms where annual pay starts as high as $160,000 and can top out well north of $1 million. While plenty of graduates are still set to embark on that career path, many others have had their dreams upended.

Part of the problem is supply and demand. Law-school enrollment has held steady in recent years while law firms, judges, the government and other employers have drastically cut hiring in the economic downturn. …

Law firms of all sizes have suffered as clients have curbed work on real-estate acquisitions, mergers, public offerings and other staples of corporate practice. They have had to fire lawyers, reduce hiring and defer the start dates of the law graduates who did receive job offers. …

Those considering law school might want to reconsider, said Allan Tanenbaum, chairman of an American Bar Association commission studying the impact of the economic crisis on the profession. Students take on average law-school debt of about $100,000 and, given the job market, many "have no foreseeable way to pay that back," he said.

 

• WSJ Law Blog, All Schooled Up, With No Place to Go, by Ashby Jones.