Thanks to shrinking class sizes, a greater percentage of new law grads find employment
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The percentage of law grads obtaining jobs requiring bar passage has increased for the third year in a row, rising from 66.6 percent for the class of 2015 to 67.7 for the class of 2016, according to findings released Wednesday by the National Association for Law Placement.
In all, 87.5 percent of the class of 2016 had a job 10 months after graduation, compared to 86.7 percent for the class of 2015, according to a NALP press release and report (PDF).
But those percentages don’t tell the whole story. The actual number of jobs dropped by 2,000. A greater percentage of grads found jobs because of a smaller graduating class size.
The number of jobs obtained by law grads has declined in every sector for the second year in a row, except for law firms with more than 500 lawyers, according to the findings. Those large firms accounted for 25.5 percent of law firm jobs in 2016, up from 23.3 percent in 2015. Even so, the number of jobs taken in the largest firms is at about 82 percent of the levels reached in 2008 and 2009.
The median salary for the class of 2016 was $65,000, up slightly from $64,800, and the national mean was $90,305, up from $83,797. The nearly 8 percent increase was affected by large law firms’ decision to increase starting pay to $180,000.
The median salary for law firm jobs was $104,000. For government jobs it was $59,000, and for jobs with public interest organizations—including legal service providers and public defenders—it was $48,500.
NALP executive director James Leipold notes in the press release that the percentage of unemployed law grads looking for work 10 months after graduation has dropped two and a half percentage points, to 8.7 percent, in the last three years. However, the unemployment rate is more than twice as high as before the recession, when employment figures were based on surveys taken nine months after graduation.
The statistics suggest “a continued tight job market for law school graduates at the 10-month mark, or at least tighter than the pre-recession market,” Leipold said in the press release. “Graduates will continue to compete with other junior lawyers for most jobs, and it is still a scrappy and entrepreneurial job market where graduates often create their own job opportunities rather than being hired for a position that is vacant.”
