"It's The Law"

[unixronin]

Some points to ponder about the practice of law in the United States:

• The United States has more lawyers than any other nation in history, more than any other nation in the world; according to some sources, more than all other nations in the world combined.
• There are about 40,000 law firms in the United States.  About 2,000 of them have more than ten lawyers.
• Coincidentally, about 40,000 new lawyers graduate and enter law practice in the United States every year.
• In 1973, about ten US corporations had legal departments with more than 100 lawyers.  By 1990, there were 250.  By 2000, there were over 500.  Some of those corporations now have over a thousand lawyers.
• There are 35% more lawyers in the United States than there are doctors.  It has been suggested that this is because there's more money in suing a doctor than in being one.

Comments

[house-pundit.livejournal.com]

When I worked for e-attorney, the bosses' understanding of the current state of affairs was that lawyers working in their field averaged about 20k a year just out of law school, that they were worked like dogs for that. Also, that the impression of lawyers making big money was, for most, a myth. It was a myth that drew a lot of bright young people into the field, but still a myth. The huge glut meant that by supply and demand, the money a young lawyer would get by salary or by hanging out his own shingle would be small.

People who go into law believe they're going to make a lot of money--or they're getting a law degree for some other reason than practice, like self-defense or ambitions in politics. Steve Stirling and Tom Kratman have law degrees, and I think David Drake is as well. Kratman came closest to using his when he taught "The Law of Land Warfare" at the Army War College for a few years.

Kratman, not practicing, went ahead and let his law license lapse so acquaintances would quit asking him for freebies.

A lot of lawyers are tax or contract attorneys, or do wills, incorporations, the rare pre-nup, or other paperwork. The US runs on a sea of paper. Or, more and more often, a sea of paper-like electrons.

This isn't really a bad thing. We tend to think of democracy and capitalism as cure-alls for foreign countries. Most of the countries it doesn't work in get sunk, hard, by cultural and functional tolerance of corruption. Our tendency to put everything in writing, and everything important in a contract, reduces corruption. Yes, you have to have honest judges, honest law enforcement, and starchy bankers to enforce those contracts; but, in a way, we're all wealthy (even our poor are wealthy by world standards of goods and services) because of our lawyers.

The ones that aren't trial lawyers are like the bacteria in your gut. You think they're a bit disgusting, and you take them for granted, but if something were to take them all away you'd be mightily uncomfortable until you got enough back to keep your processes running smoothly. ;-)

Julie