Decius wrote:
As much as I think engineering is a dysfunctional profession, I am often shocked at how other professions seem to work. As all of you know I've been interested in the law for a long time. So I took the LSAT. I got a good grade. So I applied to some schools. I got into a good school. And now, right now, I have to make a decision that will determine the rest of my life. I don't know if I can go through with this, inspite of how much I love the subject matter or what kind of difference I feel that I can make.

You would make a great lawyer. Not an attorney, but a lawyer. The difference is someone who uses their knowledge to make a difference in people's lives or craft paradigm shifts for things yet unseen versus someone who just rehashes already existing documents for obscenely expensive hourly fees.

When I look at all the C&Ds that end up on Chilling Effects, I see fear. A lawyer has convinced a corporation that if they don't vigorously defend their trademarks by threatening every blogger who mentions them in passing they won't be successful at defending that trademark when they do have a real competitive threat. This fear isn't real. There is a substantive difference between a competitive threat and a blogger, and any lawyer worth his salt ought to be able to articulate that difference in a court room. But its in the interest of the firm to stoke that fear. That fear turns into billable hours. By telling corporate managers with a straight face they have to generate these C&Ds or toss their trademark away, the firm generates revenue.

Well, I think that masses of bloggers can be even worse than a true competitive threat. There's much truth in the swarming/flashmob/long tail affects that we see in today's world. But you hit the problem right on the nose when you say that it's about self justification. A lot of the world's evils are caused by people who are just acting for self-preservation or self-relevance. That doesn't make it any less evil tho.

Fear is the reason that a handful of lawschools have dominated the market. All the professors, all the judges, and most of the top lawyers all come from a handful of schools. Those schools are expensive. Astronomically expensive. Because they can be. Because every school in the country wants professors who went to the top schools, and every corporate manager is afraid that if he isn't getting defended by a student from a top school he is going to loose his shirt.

Here's where I disagree. There's a handful of well respected lawschools for the same reason that there's a handful of respected business schools. It's more about brand than tradition or results. Lots of people go to Harvard and don't do anything with their lives. Maybe someone in their family once did. Or maybe they just never convert the knowledge into something useful. But it happens all the time. There's probably a greater number of people that go to Jolly Fats Weehawkin State and end up changing the world. Or go nowhere and change the world.

The true value of these schools isn't necessarily the educational materials or curriculum. Hell, you can get Harvard's entire catalog online. What's truly valuable there are your peers and the networking relationships you develop. It's the intersection of those thoughts and perspectives that mold and shape you, and the lingering relationships that continue to shape your life. That can't easily be replaced. It may one day, in a virtual environment. But I doubt that will ever be truly be replaced.

I'm not sure I can do it. I'm not sure that I'm interested in choosing between doing public policy work for a fraction of my present salary or entering the billable hours grind. I'm not sure I want to be chained to an office for years because of massive amounts of debt. I just don't know if its worth it. Maybe I should just drop this and remain an engineer, even though I think I'd make a far better lawyer, because life is too sort to spend 2300 hours a year working on someone else's idea of what the right problems are.

I think there's probably other choices here. Doing the firm thing definitely means a grind, but there's good experience to be had there. It's taking a step back to take two steps forward. Another path would be to be a corporate lawyer. You'd be great at helping startups or technology companies, and this is sadly a vastly underserved market. Working in government means making very little money and trying to win an appointment. The point being that your fear may be more of the unknown, but having faith in yourself and your capabilities is all you need. The rest will work out for itself.

RE: The Problem with the Legal Profession