Big Salaries Linked to Big-Name Law Schools; Small Pay Is Larger Reality
Graduates of 58 law schools make average starting salaries of $60,000 or less, a fact ignored by many of the stories touting $160,000 starting salaries at big law firms.
Instead, the reality is that there are two classes of law grads, the National Jurist reports: those who earn the big bucks and those who don’t. And the low-paying jobs are much more prevalent.
While the nation’s largest firms increased associate salaries 86 percent over the last 10 years, firms with two to 25 lawyers increased salaries by only 33 percent, according to a chart published in the article.
Another chart shows the average starting salary breakdown by law schools, with grads of 58 schools making $60,000 or less and the grads of only 17 law schools making more than $100,000.
The top four law schools, where students earned average starting salaries of $135,000, were Chicago, Duke, Michigan and Northwestern. At the next group of law schools, students earned average starting salaries of $125,000. They include the University of California at Berkeley, New York University, Pennsylvania, the University of Southern California and Virginia.
At the bottom of the list is South Dakota, whose grads earned an average starting salary of $38,251.
A hat tip to the TaxProf blog, which posted the story and listed the top 25 and lowest 25 law schools.
Story updated at 10:55 AM on 01/11/2008 to remove a reference to salaries at Chicago-Kent. The law school says reports that its average first-year pay is $125,000 are incorrect. The school’s figures for 2006 show the average starting salary is about $78,000 for all jobs and about $93,000 for new grads in private practice.
