I’m basically asking this on behalf of a friend who’s taking the LSAT in December. He’s interested in going to law school so he can “get a better job,” not necessarily practicing law but doing something other than what he’s doing now, just with a law degree. So, lawyers and other educated and enlightened Dopers, does it make sense to follow this path; the path being, I presume, being able to ask for a higher salary and benefits based on the fact one possesses a JD? Is this a useful career move?
I would give it some extremely serious thought. Not even everybody I graduated law school with was able to straight away find a good job practicing law, much less doing something else.
Lawyer-type jobs usually pay pretty damn well, but they need to in order to pay off the serious debt law students get themselves into. Your friend is signing on to incur $50,000 to $100,000 or more in debt, plus three potentially agonizing years in law school learning something he may not really like doing. I would never want to discourage someone from the study of law, but I wouldn’t want someone to get on board for the wrong reasons. A law degree will certainly make you more marketable, but if you’re not certain you want to practice law when you’re done you need to evaluate carefully just what you will be doing, and why you’re doing it.
Judith, I’d need more facts to intelligently answer the question. If your friend works in a field outside of the law, then a law degree will likely not help him. If he works in a legal field (such as legal reporting or sales to lawyers), then a J.D. will be helpful, but it’s very dependent on the particular context. (For instance, I used to work at a legal reporting company, and several of the reporters had law degrees. Several did not. Those with were often heard to complain that they did not receive increased salary or benefits despite this qualification (which, as pravnik notes, doesn’t come cheap). However, almost all of the managers had law degrees, so a J.D. probably did open doors.)
Of course, if your friend decides he might enjoy practicing law (which several of my law school colleagues did even tho’ that wasn’t their intention upon matriculation), then a law degree is pretty damn essential. 
–Cliffy, Esq.
Cliffy: OK, I’m not sure of his actual job description–it’s one of those vague Office Space-type things 20-30-somethings have at larger corporations. I think it might be billing manager or coordinator; he bills company clients. Does that help any?
As an (unemployed) management consultant (basically a “Bob” form Office Space) I can tell you that for a job in Billing or Accounts Payable or some such thing at a regular company, a Law degree is probably not helpful. One of my coworker consultants who was a former lawyer told me that the problem with getting a JD (or any specialized degree) is that you may be thought of as a “non-practicing lawyer”.
If your friend is looking to work in Evil Corporate America as something other than a Lawyer, he may be better off getting an MBA.
My very last exam of law school is tommorrow morning (yep, I’m bursting with excitement. :)). The job I am starting next January is in economic policy, not legal practice.
Even when I entered law school, I had no idea what career it would lead me to (hey, I wasn’t even 18 :)). I briefly toyed with the idea of entering into practice, but after clerking at a few law firms, I realised that that wasn’t the ideal course for me.
But my law degree won’t go to waste. I probably wouldn’t have been able to get my job I if I didn’t have a law degree on top of my BCom. Most people that enter into the policy field either have a few years experience on me, or advanced degrees in economics. Getting a law degree has enabled me to jump straight in.
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**I wouldn’t agree. Amongst other areas, my job will require me to work with stamp duty issues, business taxation and legislative drafting. My law degree will definitely help.
And it’s not just in policy that a law degree is useful. For example, around here a law degree is almost essential to enter fields such as investment banking and management consulting. Employers in these fields may not necessarily employ you for the specific knowledge you gain during your law degree; however, what is attractive to them is the critical thinking and work ethic that law school imparts on graduates.
Even if the legal education itself is disregarded, the skills picked up at law school make the degree extremely marketable.
As for money, jobs in these fields can pay as well or better than legal practice.
I think it’s really dumb to go to law school if you’re not planning on becoming a lawyer. The degree might give you an edge in getting some jobs, but not enough to justify wasting some of the best years of your life and enormous amounts of money. Once you go to law school, you’ll probably be too burned out to grad school again, so you’re stuck with law.
By the way, by “being a lawyer” I don’t mean necessarily practicing law. I don’t plan on “practicing law” per se. The jobs I’m applying for require either a law degree or a masters in a related field.
I graduated law school four years ago and have been working on Madison Ave, NYC at the same small firm (10 attorneys) my whole career. FYI – The New York law job market has two tiers – small firm with small pay (28-32k to start out of law school – really, that low) and white shoe firm (125k+ starting). But for those big $$ you gotta give big hours, and basically become an indentured servant to some partner who will never let you out of your office for 3-4 years. In small firms - usually no weekends with immense real world contact to clients/court, etc.
Nowadays, good jobs are hard to find, but they are out there. Many of my friends from law school got law jobs, though some didn’t, and most are still working (quite a feat in NYC at the moment – all my dot com buddies are on the bread line or back to bartending). I haven’t looked for a non-law job, but I would say that if you don’t have any drive to practice law, stay out of law school. The debt incurred is staggering and the curriculum is dry. You really learn nothing in law school, except a lot of information geared at passing the bar and a nasty personality trait where you demand absolute specificity from your family and friends in conversations (oh…they love that). Tell your friend to go to any law school and sit through an entire class to see what he is getting into.
Also tell him that I love what I do. I get a rush from winning a motion, helping a client, appearing in court or solving some problem through research and discussion. Its an extremely stressful and satisfying career, and its not for everyone. It also seems that many more people are going to law school now, which will glut the job market even further. And yes, non-practicing JD’s do have a ‘what? you not good enough to be a real lawyer?’ stigma. Tell your friend to think carefully, because once your in law, its tough to get away.