Q. Law School Husband: My husband and I have been
married for five years and have a 3-year-old and a 1-year-old. Since we
met, my husband has been kicking around the idea of going to law school,
but never (even with my encouragement and support) took the LSAT when
we were dating or even early in our marriage. He finally took the exam
over the winter and got a good score. This fall he is submitting
applications to law schools. However, I am dreading this process. We are
both CPAs and make a good combined income, but cutting out an income
and adding on tuition would be pushing the limit of our finances. My
husband offered to take out student loans, but I cringe at that thought
since we just paid off our undergrad loans. My husband feels that law
school is "his dream" and he doesn't want to give it up. On one hand I
understand that, but on the other hand this will put a financial strain
on our family. From a practical standpoint, l think he had plenty of
time to pursue this dream after college, but now we have a mortgage and
two very young children to consider. I want to approach this with
respect for his dream but also the practical considerations of our
family. Any advice would be really appreciated.

A: Your husband must have been spending so much time
poring over other people's books that he's neglected to read about the
prospects for new law school graduates. I'll sum up: not good. Sure some
of the 40,000 lawyers being churned out each year are finding decent
jobs, but overwhelming numbers are not. I agree with you that having
pursued a demanding, expensive educational path, now is not the time for
your husband to drop a lucrative career. It especially is not the time
to take on enormous debt and reduce your income. You are both CPAs so it
seems that the best way to approach this is with some spreadsheets
doing cost-benefit analyses, looking at the data on the prospects for
new law school graduates, and crunching the numbers on what it would
mean to have your husband out of the workforce for three years. This
doesn't mean he can never pursue his dream, but it seems to make a lot
more sense to defer it until the economy is more welcoming and your
finances more robust.