Is there a surplus of lawyers/attorneys?

Graduate School Law School
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<p>Uh, no, it is your analogy that makes no sense.</p>

<p>The major difference is that lawyers, unlike firemen, actually create their own demand. That is because there is no set demand for legal services, rather, that demand is determined by the lawyers themselves. The number of fires that happen is purely exogenous, but not the number of potential legal services, for the more lawyers you have, the more reasons that will be found for one party to sue another, which then spurs the demand for even more lawyers to defend against those lawsuits, etc. </p>

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<p>No, you don’t understand my argument. To use econspeak, what happens is that each lawyer creates an externality of positive demand for more lawyers. But that externality cannot be captured by that individual lawyer, or even by one firm. Instead, that externality accrues to the legal profession as a whole. But that means that each individual law firm has an incentive to ‘underinvest’ because that law firm disregards the positive externality it provides to the market.</p>

<p>This is a classic case of network effects and individual underinvestment. For example, the more telephones there are in the world, the more valuable each telephone becomes, because more phones in the world means more people that you can communicate with. {It’s also clearly useless for there to be only 1 phone in the world, because you wouldn’t be able to talk to anybody). But each individual phone customer doesn’t really care about the beneficial externality he provides to the others. If he buys a phone, he boosts the value of every other phone in the world, but he doesn’t care. If he disconnects his phone, he decreases the value of every other phone in the world, but he doesn’t care. He only cares about his own value. {This has been the argument used for government to step in and actively subsidize phone network buildouts because individual customers do not have sufficient incentives to purchase a socially optimal number of phones.} </p>

<p>Hence, no individual law firm can simply create demand out of the ether. All law firms together can generate demand for each other, but obviously they won’t coordinate with each other. Hence, it is entirely rational for individual law firms to reduce staff even if that reduces the externality, because by definition, each individual actor doesn’t factor in the externality. </p>

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<p>Oh, I don’t know, contingency fees perhaps?. If your lawyer doesn’t win, then you don’t have to pay him. The customer has nothing to lose; he either wins a lawsuit and gets a payout, or he loses and pays nothing. </p>

<p>Like I said, the more lawyers there are, the more of them who will be finding reasons for lawsuits, paid by contingency, which then spurs defendants to hire more lawyers to defend themselves against these lawsuits, which then spurs the litigants to hire even larger legal staffs to increase the odds of winning these lawsuits, etc. etc. </p>

<p>That speaks to the other strong network effect of the legal profession, which is its arms race characteristic. There is literally no limit to the number of lawyers you can put on a case, as long as you have the money (or the contingent potential for money). The more lawyers you have on your side, the more lawyers the other side will want to have, which then increases your demand for still more lawyers, etc.</p>

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<p>How exactly does the number of colorable claims change with the addition of more lawyers? </p>

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<p>I’m still not sure what gives you the idea that lawyers can just manufacture cases out of nowhere. Does it really sound like a sustainable business plan to take meritless claims on a contingency basis? If these claims aren’t meritless, then the lawyers aren’t creating demand, they’re just meeting demand that already exists.</p>

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<p>What about Environmental Law. That is what I am most interested in. Is there a demand for or surplus of lawyers in this field?</p>

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<p>^to sakky</p>

<p>“Let’s be perfectly honest”</p>

<p>hmmm… you remind me of Oscar Wilde, sir…</p>

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<p>which areas of the law are the most in-demand?</p>

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<p>Right now, Bankruptcy. :D</p>

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<p>I tend to agree with Sakky. I get newsletters from law firms every day, trying to build new specialties or advise our company that we really, really, really need to consult them about how a new case or regulation might affect our business, or to proactively develop new policies and procedures (the breach of which, of course, will either result in a SOX noncompliance or be pointed to as negligence someday). Lawyers don’t manufacture goods or create products. We are, however, experts at making more work for ourselves.</p>

<p>Futurenyustdent is right - bankruptcy is in demand…and there might be an uptick in securities arbitration. Otherwise, I don’t think any area of the law is really in demand right now. (Our company has lots of lawyers in nonlegal jobs in procurement, contracts, risk, accounting, sales and engineering, hoping to crack the legal dept someday.) </p>

<p>When we post a legal job, we get hundreds of resumes. If we’re looking for a new lawyer, we get resumes from lawyers with 20+ years of experience. If we’re looking for a lawyer with 20+ years of experience, we get resumes from new law graduates too…all looking for a job, any job. Federal and state governments used to be a great feeder system for new lawyers, but they’ve cut back on hiring over the years. The insurance firms used to hire a lot of new lawyers who would then move on out to law firms when they got experience, but lately I’ve worked with more insurance lawyers who are making in-house insurance defense work their career. They aren’t moving on out, making as many openings for new lawyers. Lawfirms are cutting back on hiring, since their corporate clients are cutting back on outside counsel legal budgets. </p>

<p>I suspect the most openings will be in the small towns of America, where single practitioners are greying. The cities have more than enough lawyers.</p>

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<p>As a headhunter for lawyers, I am seeing more and more resumes come in that are way off base. We recently advertised for a project finance lawyer and received several resumes for project managers who are not lawyers. That hasn’t happened in a long time, but more and more people are doing keyword searches I suppose and just papering the country. Of course, I’m getting lots of resumes from people who are unemployed - from both large firms and companies. In a market like this, people are looking nationally, rather than locally or regionally. Flexibility is crucial. </p>

<p>With regard to where the jobs are now, I still have a smattering of corporate positions, but see more openings in bankruptcy, government contracts, energy and intellectual property. I am anticipating more openings in environmental law under the new administration since environmental laws might actually be enforced, but that will take a while to happen. This is reflective of the DC/Maryland market where regulatory work still exists.</p>

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<p>The not just the number of claims, it’s really what you do with the claims. For example, you can take a single overall claim and just flood your opponent with endless numbers of actions if you have lots and lots of lawyers. That’s precisely what the tobacco industry used to do: they hired/retained thousands upon thousands of lawyers to defend themselves by drowning their plaintiffs with an endless series of motions. It took years before the state governments were finally able to devise a winning strategy against those firms, and those governments themselves had to hire armies of lawyers to help them do so. That demonstrates the arms race nature of litigation: the more lawyers you have to pursue a claim, the more lawyers your opponent is induced to have, which then spurs you to hire still more lawyers, etc. </p>

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<p>I never said that the claims are necessarily “meritless” and manufactured out of nowhere. Some of them may well be meritless, but some may be ‘meritful’. </p>

<p>Regular people don’t have full information, and hence don’t really know what lawsuit is meritless and what is not. For example, right now, maybe something is happening in my life that is in violation of my rights such that I can sue. But I don’t know that my rights are being violated, so I don’t sue. But if I end up talking to a lawyer, that lawyer might be able to tell me that I can sue. Hence, this is a case of manufactured demand, in that it is demand that would not have existed if the lawyer wasn’t around. </p>

<p>Take patent law. Let’s say that I patent an invention of mine. However, if somebody then violates my patent, I as a small inventor won’t necessarily know that, particularly if their violation occurs in an industry far removed from my own, by a company that I have never heard of before, and especially if they embed the violated patent within a system that is impossible to dismantle. For example, if I patent some new microchip design for use in my computer and then somebody violates my patent in designing a new chip within a satellite, I don’t necessarily know that that happened, especially if the patent violation is inadvertent (i.e. the other company had never read my patent before, but came up with a similar design). But a savvy patent lawyer may be able to tell me that my patent had just been violated, hence creating demand for a lawsuit that would not otherwise have happened.</p>

<p>But then of course, my willingness to sue will be determined not just by whether my case has “merit”, but also whether I actually think I can win. For example, what if it turns out that the patent violator has an army of patent lawyers? Then I might not sue because I would be afraid that ultimately they may find a way to invalidate my patent completely. Or, if I do sue, I would do so only with my own army of lawyers. Hence, I either let sleeping dogs lie, or if I attack with full force. </p>

<p>Ambrose Bierce once defined a jury as 12 people who decide who has the best lawyer. However, what he should have said is that it’s not just who has the best lawyer, but rather who has the best legal team, and the more lawyers you have, the better your legal team will be. Sad but true.</p>

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<p>Meritless lawsuits DO create more demand for lawyers-it’s called COUNTERSUING. </p>

<p>A sues B on a meritless claim. Claim gets dismissed. B turns around and sues A for wasting B’s time and resources.</p>

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<p>In this day of sanctions for filing frivolous law suits, actual meritless law suits are few and far between. However, there is a perception that many such suits exists because the media will exploit them when they occur and every defendant who has been sued believes the suit against him is frivolous.</p>

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<p>I work for the government and I am shocked at the quality and quantity of the lawyers competing for positions in our office. Environmental law is huge in our office, but you have to have experience to get in now, for anything, other than maybe handling cases involving correctional law. You can’t expect government jobs to be entry level anymore. I think if you aren’t in the top quarter of your class at a good law school, you should not bother. It was that way when I started too. A huge number of my entry level class lost their offers because we were in a major recession when I got out of school. Once you were at the firm, you had to shine and bill like hell. Its a tough time to start.</p>

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<p>You certainly don’t need a large number of lawyers to make tons of motions, and you can’t pull motions out of nowhere much more easily than you can pull claims out of nowhere. There are countless examples of small firms or sole practitioners winning trials against larger firms. Of course, biglaw likes for clients to have this same belief, that throwing a ton of people on a deal or case is the best way to handle things.</p>

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<p>If simply telling someone about a product or service they didn’t know was available to them means that you’re “manufacturing demand,” then this is in no way unique to lawyers. </p>

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<p>This is the funniest thing I’ve read in quite a while.</p>

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<p>Once agan, I tend to agree with Sakky. From my point of view (Fortune 500), we do see a lot of meritless claims. Courts do not tend to favor abuse of process claims and business libel is an ineffective cause of action, so there is little risk to plaintiffs seeking nuisance settlements. Court sanctions for frivolous suits are not as readily available as many believe, since the Courts are very reluctant to make decisions that might be construed as limiting anyone’s access to the judicial system. And then, of course, there are the infamous “pro se” litigants…does anyone really believe that a Fortune 500 will be awarded its attorneys fees for defending Joe Plumber’s barely coherent, procedurally defective suit? I don’t think most people realize how many of these frivolous suits actually are filed in this country. (Keep in mind that suits are filed before discovery – giving Mr. Pinstripe the benefit of the doubt, he may file frivolous suits without always knowing the depth of frivolity.)</p>

<p>Having a legal team also can make a huge difference. Assume you’re deposing 15 people in a month…how can a very small office thoroughly prepare for those depositions? Assume you’re producing five million emails on a disk, with a discovery cut-off in two months and a Judge who is disinclined to grant discovery delays. What is the risk that the small firm will miss something that would have warranted further discovery? Litigation is full of “hurry ups” (deadlines) and then “wait indefinitely…” (notoriously decisions on Motions for Summary Judgment). Small firms have to balance these ebbs and flows for numerous cases, with more limited resources. It can be done, of course, but it’s challenging enough that it sometimes becomes newsworthy in the law journals.</p>

<p>We are getting a bit off-point, although this is an interesting discussion. Yup, too many lawyers. And my kid is still hoping to be admitted to a T2 or T3 (even a T4) school right now, beng driven by an overwhelming desire for a legal career.</p>

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<p>Then I think you are agreeing with me. More lawyers spurs the demand for even more lawyers, even if it’s merely a matter of making the clients believe that more lawyers is better. For example, if you see that your opponent has numerous lawyers, you too will probably want to bring in numerous lawyers. </p>

<p>Now, certainly, I agree, that you don’t need tons of lawyers to pull out lots of motions. But it sure helps. Having one lawyers creating tons of motions is not as ‘productive’ as having many lawyers, each creating tons of motions. More importantly, flooding your opponent with lots of motions means that your opponent now needs to have lots of lawyers to deal with all of them. </p>

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<p>The arms race feature of law is rather unique. The more lawyers your opponent has, the more lawyers you will want to have, which then spurs your opponent to get even more lawyers, etc. </p>

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<p>Not as funny as your posts have been. </p>

<p>But actually, I think you conceded the point yourself. Perhaps it’s not that your legal team will be better, but that you will think it’s better, and more importantly, your opponent will also think it’s better, which then spurs your opponent to hire more lawyers (which then spurs you to hire even more lawyers). Again, you said it yourself - this is what the big law firms want their clients to think, and they have been evidently rather successful in doing so. So there you go again: manufactured demand for lawyers.</p>

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<p>That hasn’t stopped the $54 million pants suit. He lost (the suit AND his job) and the guy’s actually appealing now.</p>

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<p>Filing frivolous claims may increase the total amount of work for other lawyers, just as committing medical malpractice may increase the total amount of work for other physicians. That doesn’t make either one a good career strategy.</p>

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<p>Nobody is asserting that filing frivolous claims is a good career strategy.</p>

<p>All we’re saying is that the legal infrastructure, as presently constructed, encourages the demand for ever more lawyers through positive feedback effects. The more lawyers I have, then the more lawyers that you - as my potential adversary - will want to have. </p>

<p>Heck, you as a lawyer clearly don’t have to file frivolous lawsuits yourself in order to benefit from them. For example, you might spend your whole career defending clients from frivolous lawsuits. But of course, if there were no frivolous lawsuits, then your job wouldn’t exist. Hence, you then actually want others to keep filing frivolous actions, as long you win them, because that means that’s steady work for you. What you obviously don’t want is any legal reforms that prevent frivolous lawsuits.</p>

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<p>There’s no particular glory in defending against frivolous lawsuits, which by definition are easy to defend against.</p>

<p>Good lawyers prefer to spend their time on non-frivolous cases, whether they’re representing plaintiffs or defendants. They also have a strong interest in avoiding court congestion. I’ve had the distinctly unpleasant experience of preparing to try the same case for trial three times, only to be told that the trial was being rescheduled as there were no court rooms available. </p>

<p>I saw few frivolous cases during the twelve years I was working in litigation. Courtroom congestion was caused by other things: the institution of the “three strikes” that left criminal defendants little incentive to plead out their cases is one example. There was also a period early in my career when a major insurance company decided to stop offering reasonable settlements to injured plaintiffs for a couple of years, and really bottled things up.</p>

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<p>Well, we’re not talking about the kind of work that lawyers prefer to do. We’re just talking about whether there is demand for some kind of work. Easy work that lacks glory is still a heck of a better than no work at all. At least you’re still getting paid.</p>