My client’s concise estimate of her second year at a big law firm:
“Meh.”
For months, the “career” consisted of 1/3 idleness, 1/3 word-processing, and 1/3 pointless research. That morphed over time into “managing” doc review, which morphed into doing doc review, which translated into odious hours staring at odious documents on a computer and clicking “responsive/relevant” “privileged” or some euphemism for “embarrassing.” According to rumors at her firm, there’s juicy stuff squirreled away in electronic nooks and crannies – most notoriously, emails from execs hiring hookers. To date, my client’s experience of “doing doc review” has matched the edge of your seat excitement of watching drywall compound discharge moisture.
“There are days I want to scream, ‘Who are we fooling?!’” she remonstrated. (Granted, there wasn’t much use remonstrating with me, since I’m her therapist. Sometimes you just need to remonstrate – to demonstrate you can remonstrate.) “This isn’t a career – it isn’t even a job. It’s a joke. Every day I think about quitting.”
But she doesn’t.
Why?
The $160k per year.
Money changes things. Especially when your school loans top $200k.
Another client, from a while back – an NYU undergrad – was introduced to an older gentleman at a gay bar. This éminence grise offered a proposition. A partner at a major law firm, he possessed quantities of money, and an apartment on Park Avenue. They devised an arrangement. Each week, my client would ride the subway up to Park Avenue, undress in this guy’s living room, and, then… ahem …“stimulate himself to climax”…in the presence of said partner.
Why?
$400 in cash. Usually with a nice tip.
If the partner called, he showed up, no questions asked. You could say there was something in this arrangement that piqued my client’s entrepreneurial spirit. Or you could say it paid the rent.
Did he feel like a prostitute?
If you work at a large law firm, are you in any position to ask that question?
As The People’s Therapist, I’ve worked with people from all backgrounds and income levels. Yes, I’ve worked with folks who do sex work – from a woman who monetized the use of her feet for fetish parties, to a dominatrix who did quite well, thank you, spanking older, prosperous suburban gents, to a woman who danced go-go and worked a pole to earn a little cash – to the NYU student who “self-pleasured” in the company of that law partner.
Their response, for the most part, was “meh.” It’s a job. You show up, do whatever they want you to do – so long as it doesn’t violate your comfort zone – and get paid.
Karl Marx compared the bourgeois European wife of his time to a prostitute, because she was exploited as a means of production. She effectively traded her sexual, child-bearing and child-raising services for money, and was exploited by the capitalist as assuredly as one of his workers – or a prostitute.
Many of my big firm lawyer clients aren’t sure what they’re doing at the office or why they’re doing it. You keep showing up in the morning and keep leaving at night. Sometimes you aren’t doing much of anything. Other times you’re slaving away at a task you half-understand. People keep smiling and saying hello when they pass you in the hall – and that paycheck, the point of the exercise, keeps getting deposited in your bank account. As long as the firm keeps paying – heck, you’ll make phone calls, chase down research, prepare a closing table, do doc review…or whip quivering buttocks, dance on a pole, or murmur gentle exhortations while your toes are licked. What’s the difference? Who cares?
It does raise an issue: Are there lawyers who aren’t prostitutes?
I never shook off a strong regret surrounding my legal career – that I never learned how to practice law. You know – real law. Like when your friend calls because his cousin got arrested for a DUI. I have no idea what to do with a DUI. I wasn’t even a litigator – I was on the corporate side. I wouldn’t know where to start.
Here are some other things I know next to nothing about, other than in some vague, theoretical bar exam sense:
How to file for divorce.
How to close on a house.
How to write a will.
How to handle the legal necessities of a small business.
At this point, if a friend rang up with any legal question short of how to prepare for the closing of a multi-million dollar merger – or proof a securities offering – my advice would be useless.
There are lawyers out there who are not proletarian sex workers, right? Lawyers not owned by the capitalists. Lawyers who possess the means of production (as Uncle Karl would say.) Lawyers who crawl out of bondage and ascend to the petite bourgeoisie. Lawyers who “hang a shingle” and do real law. Lawyers who work for themselves.
They probably don’t earn much, and face their own struggles. But how glorious it seems! Close your eyes and dream for a moment of holding sole proprietorship of your own outfit, dictating hours, locating clients and cultivating relationships – not meeting a client once at a closing, but knowing that person, as a person, for real, from the start.
No more meaningless human resource fluff about “associate development” and “diversity.” You look in the mirror and ask yourself how you did today. No more “pulled into a deal.” You eat lunch with a human being and figure out what he needs, then you do it.
I have no idea if this is a Normal Rockwell fantasy hatched by my unconscious. Maybe the last lawyer to operate on those rules was Abraham Lincoln. The reality of working as a solo practitioner could be as exciting and profitable as waiting tables.
But it would be nice, at some level, to know practicing law isn’t simply about coming when some oddball partner with an exotic fetish happens to ring you up.
========
This piece is part of a series of columns presented by The People’s Therapist in cooperation with AboveTheLaw.com. My thanks to ATL for their help with the creation of this series.
If you enjoy these columns, please check out The People’s Therapist’s new book, Way Worse Than Being A Dentist: The Lawyer’s Quest for Meaning
I also heartily recommend my first book, an introduction to the concepts behind psychotherapy, Life is a Brief Opportunity for Joy
(Both books are also available on bn.com and the Apple iBookstore.)
The People's Therapist 
I could totally do the dominatrix or foot fetish job. Hey, why not? Consenting adults and all, and I could get out my law firm day job frustrations spanking CEOs. At that point, everyone wins.
I can run a small business – not do a divorce or DUI though.
Ha ha. At one point I was so miserable in my BigLaw job — and, as a coping mechanism, so incredibly promiscuous — that I found myself seriously considering going pro. The ONLY thing that stopped me was the fact that I was in the middle of a divorce and had to keep my nose clean. Probably in retrospect a good decision, although for the wrong reasons at the time.
My glasses fogged up.
This column (minus all of the sex work) concisely describes my situation and that of many of my friends. The old “golden handcuffs”. Hey, until they catch on and lay my butt off, if they want to keep cutting those fat checks for me to sit in this office being bored out of my skull, I’ll keep showing up. In the meantime, I’m working on figuring out what I’m going to do when I grow up, because biglaw sure as hell ain’t it.
Yeah, I prefer “loveless arranged marriage” to prostitution. My parents sold me to Law because Law looked good, and I’m still here because it pays the bills and I’m too used to the comfortable lovelessness to leave.
But someday I’ll hit Law (this version of it) with a shovel and bury it in the basement.
My parents sold me to Engineering. Then I sold myself to Law.
I would kind of feel guilty if I abandoned Law at the moment. Clients constantly email me about how I’m “their only hope” and how they are now homeless. And they keep trying to commit suicide and cut themselves.
Although the woman who is still drinking herself to death is starting to annoy me.
Poverty law. The opposite of BigLaw.
Since law school all I’ve done is child support enforcement for the state until 12 weeks ago when I joined a small town solo office. The solo I joined has worked in our small town for 40 years doing wills, settling estates, doing house and farm closings. He knows everyone and everyone knows and respects him. His depth of knowledge is staggering to me. I am finding it quite satisfying to write a will for someone you see at the school or settle the estate for my husband’s co-worker’s parent.
I don’t get it. Working for someone else makes you a prostitute? So every bus driver, IT guy, fire fighter, accountant, social worker, etc., is no more than a hooker?
I don’t understand why you spew pure negativity about law firms, Will. I work at a law firm and like it just fine. I understand you had a bad experience, but do you have to project it on everyone else?
Yes, it’s clear you don’t get it. It is not the point of the article that the mere act of working for someone else makes you a prostitute.
I work at a biglaw firm and have many good friends who also work, or have worked, at biglaw firms – some work or worked for the same firm where I work; others at other similarly big firms. Based on my experience, if you enjoy your job at a biglaw firm, you are decidedly in the minority.
Most associates I know are not living a life of passion, let alone merely enjoying what they do for a living. They report for duty because of the golden handcuff syndrome. They are being paid a nice six-figure salary, which pays their law school debt, and they have gotten themselves a nice car and nice house, and now they find they are wed to the job, whether they love it or not.
I absolutely agree with LTL.
Biglaw, people have to work for a paycheck. Sometimes the work that you do is not the thing you’re most “passionate” about or even something you “enjoy”. That’s why they pay you for it and call it “work.” Otherwise it’s called “fun” and you do it for free. And usually, the more money they pay you the less pleasant and/or harder the work is. If you don’t like it, do something less difficult and/or more fun, and make less money. But please, stop whining.
Well, Erin, that’s certainly a depressing view. And I see no “whining” in anything I’ve said.
There’s an old saying: “Enjoy what you do and you’ll never work a day in your life.” Where is it written that “people HAVE to work for a paycheck”? I know lots of people who do not work for a paycheck. And where is it written that even if you do work for a paycheck, it has to be at a soul-destroying, passionless job. Just because it’s your job doesn’t mean it has to be drudgery or torture.
Conversely, just becuase a person enjoys what they do for a living doesn’t mean they should do it for free. I know people who love their job and are paid handsomely to do it – the best of both worlds.
I’m sorry you’ve bought into the standard trope that if you want to make a lot of money, you have to suffer through a miserable job, and that if you do what you enjoy, you have to make less money. There are too many examples out there that disprove that meme.
And yes, in fact, I am working on doing something different. It is not a matter of being “less difficult” – my job isn’t all that hard, really. It’s just not fulfilling. If someone paid you $250,000 per year to lick stamps 10 hours a day, how long would that keep you satisfied?
i am in the medical field, and have this conversation quite often with medical residents and fellows. they seem to feel they are somehow different or special because of the amount of grunt work they do for their pay, but when it comes down to it the ratio of my salary to edu debt is identical to their salary to edu debt. the difference is i’ll be grunting along making $50,000 a year, while they will be grunting along making $300,000 a year.
many of us feel tied to their jobs/careers/fields because of the income, it is just that the most of those people aren’t making 6 figures, they are lucky to be making $25,000.
just remember if your household is making over $100,000 a year, you are doing better than 85% of American households.
I spent the first 30 years of my legal career dancing to the dictates of others at a well known global law firm of nearly 2000 lawyers. I attained the gold ring of partnership but never felt in control of my own destiny and worked for client’s to whom I felt no particular connection. I was surviving but not thriving. Recently I struck out on my own and wonder why I didn’t do it years ago. I now have clients that I like and care about and for the first time in my career I’m having fun and feel like a real lawyer. Law is not inherently an oppressive profession. There is a better way.
I’ve actually learned to do all the things that Will mentions — divorces, wills, real estate, small business — only since leaving S&C, after four years of “pioneering” tax work on asset-based securities for Goldman Sachs (now that was a real contribution to the world’s well-being!). Oh, and I learned that I have a terrific eye for picking out a race horse and managing its career.
Part of the trick is to have a finite goal — pay off the student loans, pay for the kids’ tuition, get a big enough down-payment so you can keep the house after you leave BigLaw — and a timetable. In my case, quitting time was just after the final bonus check needed for my daughter’s college tuition. Two more years and I would have been brain-dead.
If you love your big law firm job so much why are you reading this column? This column is obviously geared towards people who are unhappy at big law firms. Sure there are “tons” of people who are happy at big law firms and “love” their jobs. Woo-hoo! Great for them. I am HAPPY for them. But there are probably more people who are unhappy at a big law firm and need some support to get through each day. Will, your analogy to prostitution is something that is discussed by associates at big law firms all the time. I’m glad you are willing to put it in writing to let others know that they are not alone.
This article is stupid.
As compared to your pithy rejoinder, I suppose?
Like.
Will, seriously, you live in your own deluded world. Even in moments like this when it seems as if you just might break free of your “Big Law is all that exists” mental vise you fall hopelessly back into thinking that anything else is just a myth. HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF LAWYERS DO WHAT YOU DESCRIBED. Every day. You’re willing to dream of Oz, but if it really exists, well then shit, you’re forced to admit that not only did you make the wrong choice (for you) by going into Big Law, but you didn’t even have the foresight and gumption to chase your dream of doing “real law” by, you know, DOING IT. You’re the only reason you don’t know how to do those things you dream of and haven’t done them. Wake up. Oz isn’t Oz that can’t happen, it’s hanging a shingle instead of going to Hunter College so you can later complain that that reality doesn’t or can’t exist.
Every time I read one of your blogs, I’m reminded why I said forget it after summering in biglaw and went back to not for profit where I belong (and do work that means something to someone).
Ditto. I spent my first four years in practice with a small firm doing family law. Nothing, no amount of compensation, can make family law worth it. I felt like I went thru my own divorce 500 times. Horrible.
The straw that broke the camel’s back was a pompous, nasty judge who blamed counsel for the parties’ behavior on a Friday, and demanded that we attend a hearing on Monday despite the fact that I was leaving the state that afternoon for the first vacation (one week) since graduating from law school. Yes, opposing counsel and I were able to work it out and avoid the Monday hearing, but the judge’s order was just too frickin’ much for me.
I resigned my job while on that vacation, and was hired for my current gig that week. Since then (over 10 years), I have had a wonderful, meaningful gig as a public lawyer (at predictably meager pay with a pay CUT scheduled to begin July 1 due to state budget issues). It’s worth it. Life is not all about big money. Quality of life means so much more.
I would take it about 100 steps farther than thedozingpanda. Millions of middle class Americans do the same thing, albeit for lesser pay. Almost all of us work so that we can take home a paycheck to support our lifestyle – whether that’s being a slave to the golden cuffs or making $35K a year driving a truck. The trick is to stop wasting your time with shrinks like Meyerhofer in the absurd hope that he will direct you toward life satisfaction. Don’t beat yourself up about taking the paycheck for the miserable work. Use the money wisely; your definition of wise might include snorting the money and blowing it all on a lavish lifestyle. Mine might entail saving to pay my loans. The key is to realize that a job doesn’t define you, not all jobs are suitable for all people and for some Biglaw attorneys there is nothing wrong with coveting that kind of lifestyle. A job is just a job. As long as you work for someone other than yourself, you are theoretically a whore under Meyerhofer’s definition. So be it; most Americans are whores. A job allows you to exist in our society and do what you want with the rest of your life.
During the last six or so months before I left my horrible private practice gig, I saw a “shrink” (a former attorney who specialized in counseling attorneys). Her advice was priceless. She helped me understand and balance my personal priorities. Without her advice, I don’t think I would have shoved that job when I did.
Ditto with coaches – a good one can be an enormous help in getting your head straight for your future.
Agreed. It helps to get counseling from someone who understands what you’re going through because he’s “been there.” Just ask any veteran (particularly Vietnam vets).
Will has been in BIGLAW, and while he’s vehemently opposed to it, his clients decide how much of his advice they want to accept in their quest for happiness. Some may become as jaded as he is and quit immediately, while others may adopt the reasonable perspective espoused by many on this thread, namely, setting a timetable or financial goal before pulling the ripcord.
Will, there are plenty of law jobs that are not about doing the bidding of a partner. In fact, the vast majority of them are that. Sometimes they are no more glamorous. I have done my share of doc review for divorce cases. But I have also helped a 12-year-old deal deal with the legal and personal implications of being removed from her mother’s care in an abuse / neglect case. Some days, I find the law silly, and other days I think it is the greatest service we can provide. BigLaw gets most of the attention in the news, and about 99.9% of the attention on your site, but it is absolutely not the only type of law out there. I know that I could leave the law tomorrow and do something else (teach yoga, for example), and I do not stay for the money. I stay because of the work I want to do. Actually, I am currently getting my LLM, but when I return to the States, I will be back in the trenches representing children . . . because the law is a place where we truly can do good, if we find the right path. As for owning my own practice, I’m far too scared to do that. 😉
Spot on.
Years ago I worked at a large law firm, and I think i followed the pattern that many follow.
The first year, i was entranced by the money and the trappings and the gentile atmosphere that was on the surface of every interaction. They threw some decent work at me, and I learned a little about how lawyers work and live. There was a lot of talk in the ranks about how prestigious and learned the partners and some associates were. I didn’t know any better, but they wore expensive suits, and spoke and acted with the understated tenor of old money.
The second year, the patina of dignity and prestige had worn thin. This was a large firm. There was only so much good work, and other associates grew jealous of any good work thrown my way. And that work was dwindling. It was more document review. I attended one deposition. I watched a hearing. I thought, “I can do better than this guy.”
By my third year, I escaped to work for the Federal Government. Within two years, I was arguing appeals, had trial work, beau coup depositions. And I looked back at my firm life, especially that first year, and thought – “Wow. I wasn’t even aware of know how little I was learning.” And now that I was in court, facing the BigLaw partners and associates that were once my contemporaries, I was met with the realization that so few of these people know what they’re doing.
If you’re working at a large law firm and are relatively content, there’s a possibility that you don’t know what you don’t know. You may enjoy your work, perhaps because you’re easily amused or have a low threshold for satisfying or challenging work. But understand that there’s also the possibility that you are, in fact, learning very little and are simply not aware of it, because the people around you don’t have the experience to tell you different.
Just a thought.
Gentile atmosphere? Was it Ropes & Gray?
that’s what i call LOWERING THE BAR, or the pole – or whatever people are dancing around these days. living in NYC is expensive, and i think that pole dancing dances around that very issue. very demeaning for women and men.
He is CLEARLY talking about a sector of people who don’t like their biglaw jobs and continue to work for the pay akin to the strippers and prostitutes that don’t like their jobs and continue to work because of the pay. If you can’t figure that out I’d hate to have your dimwitted self as my attorney. Geeze.
If u want to know how to write a will close on a hpuse be a real lawyer u take courses at the local bar Adam. Document production is not meaningless it is the heart of any litigation. If facts change outcome at trial changes. You are an idiot and are not sufficiently self motivated to be a real lawyer. Also the work at the big law firms is not abt being a prostitute. It’s about absorbing albeit in an inchoate fashion the mores of the position and paying your dues for a very lucrative return
Practtioner for 20 years.
It’s well-established that I am not sufficiently self-motivated to be a real lawyer. However, I disagree with your assertion that I’m an idiot.
“It’s about absorbing albeit in an inchoate fashion the mores of the position and paying your dues for a very lucrative return”
i can’t be sure, given your impressive use of $5 words, but my guess is you’re trying to say that the profession is pretentiously vague in its communications and that you are well paid for it.
Practtioner for 20 years, and enabled by Spell Check for every one of them.
“It’s about absorbing albeit in an inchoate fashion the mores of the position and paying your dues for a very lucrative return.”
Actually he’s right – or he WAS right once upon a time. Before the true rise of BIGLAW in the 1980s or so, the legal profession was in many ways like the medical profession. You paid your dues for the first few years of practice and learn what it was to be a “real lawyer” from a partner who was willing to mentor you (or at least let you sit in on meetings, depositions and trials to absorb things on your own). Today, partners in firms (both large and small), don’t bother to mentor young associates. They believe most associates are fungible. For those associates that are “stars,” partners often see them as threats – someone who will ask for a piece of the pie or try to steal clients. The transition of law from a profession to a business is now complete.
P.S. You can still learn something as a BIGLAW associate and get paid hansomely. It’s just simply up to you to insist on the opportunties to do so.
“The reality of working as a solo practitioner could be as exciting and profitable as waiting tables.”
You pretty much nailed it. The grass is always greener, I guess. I’m thinking about going back and getting my MBA…
Daniel is absolutely right, as it associate who posted the saying “Enjoy what you do and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.” I’ve worked for both the government and for BigLaw, and I feel sorry for the associates on this page who apparently believe (or have rationalized to themselves) that a job is supposed to be “a job” and that’s why it’s called “work. ” During the many years I worked as a prosecutor, I loved my job and felt like the work weeks went by way too fast. When Friday would roll around I would think, “It’s Friday already??” I have yet to meet an associate (or partner, for that matter) who feels that way about their job. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that I would continue to do the work I did even if I won the lottery.
Now, as a single parent with kids to support, I work at a law firm. It could be worse so I am not complaining, but it is nowhere near as fulfilling and engaging as my government jobs. The point is that it is NOT true that a job is supposed to feel like “work.” Anyone who says that is just exhibiting their lack of experience.
Will:
My experience is the exact opposite of yours. I started out as an assistant district attorney, tried 200+ cases over 4 years, and then quit to go solo. I then did lots of criminal, DUI, real estate closings etc.
I didn’t want to spend my life doing shitlaw, so while DUI/criminal/RE paid the bills, I taught myself, as best I could, complex federal litigation (products liability, IP, class actions, etc). I took clients and then associated boutique firms until I learned enough that I was comfortable. I then built my own boutiqe and began litigating against BigLaw firms. I had always regretted that I never got the BigLaw experience. There’s alot that goes on behind the scenes that is hard to pick up. But apparently you don’t learn it till you become a senior associate or junior partner. After a while, I picked it all up.
It is harder to get BigLaw type clients than small law clients. Last week a potential new copyright litigation client that was supposed to hire me went with Kirkland & Ellis. But I’ve gotten my share. After all, sales is sales.
If biglaw associates understood the big picture, it might be easier for them. If they also understood how easy it is to make money on your own (even if all you do is criminal, divorce, PI etc.) they’d calm down and not be afraid of the biglaw boss. It’s much easier to drop out of biglaw and do crim/PI/divorce than to climb up from small law to do sophisticated litigation. When I was an ADA, after 2 years, I was no longer afraid of my boss. I knew that if I got fired, I could just practice on my own like the dozens of people that I saw every day in court. Biglaw associates don’t really understand this. They think that they are on a cliff hanging on by their finger nails; but they don’t realize that their feet are only 5 inches off the ground.
I’m still in a firm but I tend to agree with AH. In the last 5 years I’ve seen law firm friends get disgusted and quit to go solo, or get pushed out and land solo. Many are making it – the ones who WANTED to be solo are really making it because they value having their own businesses. And seeing this makes me lose my fear of The Firm in a lot of ways too – worst case scenario I’d be doing shitlaw, and paying the bills, which is better that not paying the bills at all.
“Biglaw associates don’t really understand this. They think that they are on a cliff hanging on by their finger nails; but they don’t realize that their feet are only 5 inches off the ground.”
I love you for this comment, AH. You are right, and it gives me hope on hard days. I looked it up today to read it again – I’ve got a decent, tolerable deal, but if things got ugly I would survive. And that’s really what life gets down to – surivival shot through with moments where everything is beautiful and you can’t belive your good luck, and a some moments of shit too.
I am one of the partners/owners of a small law firm in Nashville, TN. I am grateful every day to have work I enjoy doing for clients I like. I know how to write a will, administer an estate, contest a will, draft a complaint in a contract or personal injury matter, represent a client before a social Security Administrative law judge, and I don’t know where the time flies every workday.
So grateful I’m not at a big law firm.
This is what I’m starting to retrain myself to do. The combination of boredom and stress at the larger firm is starting to really kill me (this time, finally) – maybe I’d prefer being a real lawyer who actually does real lawyer stuff and has a purpose in life?
Bad comparison. There’s nothing demeaning in an honest day’s work, even if you hate your work. Rarely do people love it. I wouldn’t compare any office work to sex trade work.
The loving reverence to Marx as “Uncle Karl” is telling too. If you think working for a firm is slave work, try working for the state, in exchange for food and shelter.
Finally, choosing to raise your kids in exchange for support is not akin to prostitution, because you can’t assume the named contributions are the ONLY consideration on the table. Ideally, people enter into marriages for reasons other than money, and you can’t discount that.
I don’t know what all the negativity is about. First, consider that there are many people out there who don’t HAVE jobs, much less jobs that pay as well as law jobs at any decent (though not top tier) firm.
Whether a job has enough meaning for a person is something every individual must consider, but don’t think for a moment that this is unique to the legal profession – do you think that factory workers derive a special pride from the notion that they’re making something physical that exists in the world that you can put your hands on rather than something less tangible such as providing legal services?
Some people take pride in their work like that (and God bless them for their positive attitude), but others do not — just as some lawyers consider what they do an artform and craft whereas others consider it drudgery. My view is that if you are dissatisfied with your work, you should first consider whether you are overestimating how much life satisfaction you can really derive from work, period, or, better than that, count yourself lucky, as you likely have more blessings to count than you realize.
If you do not find meaning in your work (and, like I said, many, MANY people do not), find meaning in your friendships, in your faith (if you have one), in good books, in hobbies, or in the gym. There’s a lot out there, if you look.
But if when all is said and done and you don’t like practicing law, you don’t have to; there are many worthwhile pursuits outside of law. And by leaving you might make a space for someone who will enjoy your current job more than you do, and will in that sense be doing something worthwhile for both yourself and another.
great blog Will. I especially enjoyed reading your entries on quitting law school and the myth of the versatile law degree. As bad as the biglaw associates may have it, try graduating jobless with $200,000 in non-dischargeable debt, sending hundreds of resumes out to complete silence.
I like reading Will’s posts tho I have been working in biglaw for more years than I want to admit. I don’t hate it all the time — I’ve made some great friends, won some cases and done some crazy sleep deprived things — but there are def times when I want to say screw it. Will’s site is like a pressure release, makes me think what-if. I enjoy the writing as well. He’s dead on right that there’s an element of selling yourself. You have to be able to live with it.
I think that there is a disgusting amount of pretense in the idea of comparing life as a biglaw attorney to that of a prostitute. We are talking about a job that pays a six-figure salary to people as young as 24/25. These are jobs that most law students would give a kidney to have in this economy, and most laypeople in poor communities cannot imagine having the opportunity to attain. And we have people here complaining that their $160,000/year job is “boring” or “tedious.” Fucking please.
Are you not aware that almost every other career path with a graduate degree pays nothing even close to these salaries, but are still fiercely competitive and likely do not rouse the deep passions of everyone who engages in them?
If you don’t like your biglaw job and have the gall to complain about it, please open up your spot to one of the thousands of law students in deep debt who would love to take it, and who would appreciate it and not be so odiously pretentious as to bemoan the fact that work is sometimes boring.
Get over yourself
Well, it is worth pointing out that a high-class prostitute who knows what he or she is doing can make a six-figure salary as well. But the work is, admittedly, boring and tedious.
i have always told people that lawyers are like prostitutes because for the right amount of money they will do whatever you want.
“If you don’t like your biglaw job and have the gall to complain about it, please open up your spot to one of the thousands of law students in deep debt who would love to take it, and who would appreciate it and not be so odiously pretentious as to bemoan the fact that work is sometimes boring.”
Thank you.
Damn. i kept reading on for a discussion about pole dancers.
what a let down
Hi,
I totally agree on all of what you are saying. I just read 10 of your articles. I have been working in a big Montreal law firm for three years now. I often feel used, depressed, and I felt dead for most of the time I’ve been there.
I also been sexually harassed at work recently. I reported. The manager asked me if I was “sure” of what really happened. At the end of the conversation, he informed me that since the firm really needed the person’s expertise, that if someone needed to leave, it would be me. Afterwards, people were saying jokes in front of me about people “being harrassed” in the office.
There were 2 nice partners working with me and protecting me. They both left at the same time two years ago, leaving me alone in my department to handle the files for around 8 months, even if I only had one year of experience. I got no support, but kept on doing the work of 3 persons, including two partners. At the end of the year, they refused to give me a decent wage increase because I made a couple of “mistakes” during the year I was alone. The nice ones leave, and it definitely is a lose-lose situation for the one staying.
All of this is so true. I really stayed there for the money, I had this loan to repay.
Except that since I started the slow fading technique you talked about, I am reimbursing really fast, and this loan will be completely reimbursed in two months. I already have a couple of clients by myself, and I will be leaving the firm and trying solo. I need to believe this solo model still exists and can work! Maybe I’ll fail, but at least I will have tried! I will also try painting in my free time, we’ll see if this can work…
By the way, to all law students reading, of my entire circle of friends from law school, NO one likes its job. No one. We are a group of roughly 25 persons still hanging out together. We used to be all happy people, partying, making jokes. Now, a lot of us are only a shadow of what they used to be. None of them like their job. And before starting to work in firms, we were all so enthusiastic. Their seems to be a problem with this whole business model in firms.
Mr. Meyerhofer, your articles are a total relief for me, Thank you,