Salaries

Nalp is reporting what we've known all along. New lawyer salaries are bimodal. Quite a few people graduate law school and make a lot of money. About the same number graduate law school and make very little money. Both have to pay off the same amount of debt. Almost no one comes out and gets what they truly deserve.

In our area what this means is, there are a limited number of $100,000 jobs. If you get one, good for you. If you don't, your first offer will probably be between $35k-50k. I honestly feel like I'm worth somewhere between $60k-80k. Much more is lagniappe and much less is not worth the debt (or effort) incurred to get the degree. Unfortunately, those jobs don't exist. The difference between big and small law firms in this instance is staggering.