Following up on my previous post, ABA Releases Class Of 2024 Jobs Data: ‘Maximum Credit’ Jobs Rate Rises To 89.7%, Up From 88.0% Last Year: NALP, The Class of 2024 Defies Expectations, Surpasses Last Year’s Record Employment Gains:
NALP today released Employment for the Class of 2024 — Selected Findings, a preview of the upcoming annual report Jobs & JDs: Employment and Salaries of New Law School Graduates, highlighting key outcomes that reveal a standout year for the Class of 2024. The new data, available at www.nalp.org/classof2024, shows that this graduating class defied widespread legal industry predictions — breaking numerous employment records set just one year earlier by the Class of 2023.
NALP Executive Director Nikia Gray said, “Congratulations are in order for the Class of 2024 and all those who supported them. When this class enrolled in 2021, many in the industry including NALP issued warnings about how its larger size would affect the entry-level employment market.”
Gray continued, “In the end, it turned out to be over 3,700 additional jobs they needed to source compared to the Class of 2023 but the 2024 graduates — and the NALP community — met that challenge, resulting in the highest overall employment rate as well as the highest employment rate in bar admission required jobs NALP has ever recorded. And with only 6.8% of those employed continuing to look for other positions, all signs point to graduates being satisfied with the jobs they were able to obtain.” …
Highlights:
- The employment rate for the Class of 2024 reached a record high of 93.4% among graduates for whom employment status was known, marking a 0.8 percentage point increase over the previous year. NALP’s tracking of employment rates based on all graduates with a known employment status began with the Class of 1982.
- The unemployment rate, which includes both graduates seeking and not seeking employment, was just 5.1%, a new all-time low.
- The percentage of graduates securing jobs for which bar admission is required or anticipated (attorney positions) improved by 2.2 percentage points to 84.3% for the Class of 2024 — the highest level recorded since NALP introduced the job classifications in 2001.
- Among employed graduates, 58.9% secured positions in private practice — a 0.7 percentage point increase and the highest percentage since 1992.
- The national median salary for the Class of 2024 grew to a new record high of $95,000, up 5.6% compared to the median of $90,000 for the previous class. …
- Public service jobs, including military and other government jobs, judicial clerkships, and public interest positions, accounted for 32.7% of jobs obtained by employed graduates — a level surpassed only by the Class of 1975. …
- Nearly two-thirds of employed graduates (65.0%) were employed in the same state in which they attended law school.
NALP, Salary Distribution Curves:
For a number of years NALP has prepared a graphic to illustrate the bi-modal nature of the distribution of salaries obtained by law school graduates. Over the years the graphic has illustrated that about half of salaries fall into a left-side peak, currently in the $55,000 – $100,000 range, and that the large firm salary typical at the time the class graduated produces a sharper peak to the right. …
- NALP, Class of 2024 National Summary Report
- NALP, Class of 2024 Salary Distribution Curve
- ABA Journal, Record-Setting Employment Rate For Class of 2024 Law Grads Comes With Asterisk, New NALP Report Finds
- Reuters, 2024 US Law Grads Posted Record-High Employment, Survey Shows
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