4 ms·

I don’t think as many “smart people” go to law school any more. Pretty sure law school enrollment has been on the decline for awhile.

by xoxoy 6y ago

loufe 6y ago
I suppose that depends on where you live. In Canada, at least, law programs continue to have very competitive entry requirements and the market for lawyers is rather saturated meaning salaries are relatively low for post-graduate professions.
- MiroF 6y ago
  > rather saturated meaning salaries are relatively low for post-graduate professions. Not a contradiction. This is exactly why the proportion of very smart people going into law is decreasing.
irishcoffee 6y ago
I don’t know if it’s on the decline, but I do know that a whole lot of people graduate college and have a “now what? Law school.” Moment
- xoxoy 6y ago
  Maybe 15 years ago. Not today.
  - graeme 6y ago
    You’re wrong. There was a big drop in 2010-2012, but then it started rising again. Can’t find it for the us, but you can see it rose consistently in ontario: https://www.ouac.on.ca/statistics/olsas-application-statistics/ https://www.ouac.on.ca/statistics/olsas-application-statisti...
    - xoxoy 6y ago
      I’m not talking about Canada
      - wutbrodo 6y ago
        I live in the US and I've seen this anecdotally too. If you're moderately smart, didn't do much in your early career[0], and aren't technical, law school is one of the things people grasp for to level up into a real career. [0] or took a shot at a career that didn't go anywhere, like in Hollywood or politics or any other industry built on an underclass of lied-to 21 year olds
        xoxoy 6y ago
        It’s less common now than 10-20 years ago is what I’m saying. Law school enrollment is down. Graduates have more options like non-technical roles in large tech companies. Students are fed up with debt and law school is notoriously expensive and gets more so every year. I mean you can look and enrollment figures and law school closures over last few years. This isn’t just a “hunch”. The whole “I don’t know what to do with my life so I’ll apply to law school” is like a meme from 2004.
        wutbrodo 6y ago
        Sure yea, no doubt that it's declined. But the parent comment that you disagreed specifically agreed with it declining, and your response was that this isn't much of a phenomenon anymore (not that it had declined).
        pkaye 6y ago
        Here is a graph of law school enrollment. I think it increased a small amount after 2015. https://data.lawschooltransparency.com/enrollment/all/ https://data.lawschooltransparency.com/enrollment/all/
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
diminish 6y ago
hope so - as US legal tradition is pretty much a negative-sum-game
curiousllama 6y ago
Harvard, Yale, Stanford, etc. aren't seeing a drop in the quality of applicants. I get the impression there's a very elite group that Musk would consider "smart" - and they have no issues getting into a T-14 law school.
- xoxoy 6y ago
  So what? That’s not “too many” - the collective enrollment per class of those 3 schools is like 1000 students.
  - CydeWeys 6y ago
    There are fourteen T-14 schools, not just three.
    - xoxoy 6y ago
      Still don’t see your point. We need some lawyers. We don’t need millions. If the only law schools that existed were the T-14 where aggregate enrollment is like 4000 a year then that’s hardly “too many”
      - londons_explore 6y ago
        If all the lawyers in the world lost 10 IQ points, which were redistributed to the non-lawyers, who would lose out? I argue that law is an adversarial profession - what matters is if you are smarter than the lawyer in the other side of the courtroom. If everyone was less good, outcomes would be much the same, and we as a society could redistribute those smart people to engineering problems where those IQ points will make the difference between inventing something useful or not.
        otterley 6y ago
        As an attorney who has seen what actually happens in the courtroom, I can tell you that the smartest lawyer does not always win the case, and that judges will often go out of their way to help lawyers who look like they’re tangled up. Being on the right side of the law often helps more.

I don’t think as many “smart people” go to law school any more. Pretty sure law school enrollment has been on the decline for awhile.

by xoxoy 6y ago

I don’t think as many “smart people” go to law school any more. Pretty sure law school enrollment has been on the decline for awhile.

loufe 6y ago

I suppose that depends on where you live. In Canada, at least, law programs continue to have very competitive entry requirements and the market for lawyers is rather saturated meaning salaries are relatively low for post-graduate professions.

MiroF 6y ago
> rather saturated meaning salaries are relatively low for post-graduate professions. Not a contradiction. This is exactly why the proportion of very smart people going into law is decreasing.

irishcoffee 6y ago

I don’t know if it’s on the decline, but I do know that a whole lot of people graduate college and have a “now what? Law school.” Moment

xoxoy 6y ago
Maybe 15 years ago. Not today.
- graeme 6y ago
  You’re wrong. There was a big drop in 2010-2012, but then it started rising again. Can’t find it for the us, but you can see it rose consistently in ontario: https://www.ouac.on.ca/statistics/olsas-application-statistics/ https://www.ouac.on.ca/statistics/olsas-application-statisti...
  - xoxoy 6y ago
    I’m not talking about Canada
    - wutbrodo 6y ago
      I live in the US and I've seen this anecdotally too. If you're moderately smart, didn't do much in your early career[0], and aren't technical, law school is one of the things people grasp for to level up into a real career. [0] or took a shot at a career that didn't go anywhere, like in Hollywood or politics or any other industry built on an underclass of lied-to 21 year olds
      - xoxoy 6y ago
        It’s less common now than 10-20 years ago is what I’m saying. Law school enrollment is down. Graduates have more options like non-technical roles in large tech companies. Students are fed up with debt and law school is notoriously expensive and gets more so every year. I mean you can look and enrollment figures and law school closures over last few years. This isn’t just a “hunch”. The whole “I don’t know what to do with my life so I’ll apply to law school” is like a meme from 2004.
        wutbrodo 6y ago
        Sure yea, no doubt that it's declined. But the parent comment that you disagreed specifically agreed with it declining, and your response was that this isn't much of a phenomenon anymore (not that it had declined).
      - pkaye 6y ago
        Here is a graph of law school enrollment. I think it increased a small amount after 2015. https://data.lawschooltransparency.com/enrollment/all/ https://data.lawschooltransparency.com/enrollment/all/
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]

diminish 6y ago

hope so - as US legal tradition is pretty much a negative-sum-game

curiousllama 6y ago

Harvard, Yale, Stanford, etc. aren't seeing a drop in the quality of applicants. I get the impression there's a very elite group that Musk would consider "smart" - and they have no issues getting into a T-14 law school.

xoxoy 6y ago
So what? That’s not “too many” - the collective enrollment per class of those 3 schools is like 1000 students.
- CydeWeys 6y ago
  There are fourteen T-14 schools, not just three.
  - xoxoy 6y ago
    Still don’t see your point. We need some lawyers. We don’t need millions. If the only law schools that existed were the T-14 where aggregate enrollment is like 4000 a year then that’s hardly “too many”
    - londons_explore 6y ago
      If all the lawyers in the world lost 10 IQ points, which were redistributed to the non-lawyers, who would lose out? I argue that law is an adversarial profession - what matters is if you are smarter than the lawyer in the other side of the courtroom. If everyone was less good, outcomes would be much the same, and we as a society could redistribute those smart people to engineering problems where those IQ points will make the difference between inventing something useful or not.
      - otterley 6y ago
        As an attorney who has seen what actually happens in the courtroom, I can tell you that the smartest lawyer does not always win the case, and that judges will often go out of their way to help lawyers who look like they’re tangled up. Being on the right side of the law often helps more.