The Economic Value of a Law Degree
by Michael Simkovic and Frank McIntyre · Journal of Legal Studies (University of Chicago)
Empirical study using Census SIPP earnings data to estimate the lifetime earnings premium of a JD over a bachelor's degree. It controls for ability, unemployment and gender, and finds a mean pretax lifetime value near $1 million, with wide variation and downside risk.
More resources on Legal Careers
Failing Law Schools
Law professor's critique of American legal education. Covers how rankings competition, ABA accreditation rules and federal loans drove tuition and debt far beyond what most graduates' legal jobs pay, and which students the degree serves well or badly.
The Elastic Tournament: The Second Transformation of the Big Law Firm
Stanford Law Review article on how large US law firms changed after 1990: cyclical associate hiring, permanent off-track lawyers, non-equity partnership, de-equitization and equity concentrated among partners who control clients. Explains the real odds of making partner. This is the structural explanation behind Big Law career decisions: why most associates leave, what 'partner' now means, and why firm incentives look the way they do. The data predates 2008, but the model still describes today's two-tier partnerships.
Law School Transparency (LSAC LawHub)
School-by-school reports built from ABA-mandated employment disclosures: full-time bar-passage-required jobs, Big Law and clerkship placement, salaries, tuition and projected debt payments. Also has side-by-side comparisons and a cost-of-attendance calculator. This is the quickest way to answer 'what will this degree get me, and what will it cost?' from primary data, not school marketing. It turns raw ABA filings into comparable per-school job and debt figures. A free LawHub account is required.
Harvard Law School OPIA Career and Application Guides
Harvard Law's public interest office publishes about 20 free career guides: prosecution, public defense, legal services, state and local government, DOJ Honors/SLIP, US Attorney's Offices, plaintiffs' firms and more. Each covers the work, hiring, fellowships and alumni career narratives. This is the most complete free coverage of the non-firm half of legal careers: government and public interest. Each guide gives a sector's work, hiring mechanics (for example, decentralized, budget-tied state hiring and AG/SG honors programs) and first-person alumni paths.
Chambers Associate: Practice Areas, Firm Reviews and Recruiting Guide
Free US guide to large-firm careers. It has practice-area overviews of what associates do day to day, quoting named partners; firm reviews built on thousands of associate surveys and interviews; and recruiting timelines from 1L onward. This is the best free source on what Big Law work actually involves, practice area by practice area (for example, the Capital Markets page has 'What lawyers do' and 'Realities of the job' sections), plus firm-by-firm associate experience.
FQPS QWE Checker — free qualifying work experience guide
A free, public six-question guide for aspiring solicitors in England and Wales who want to understand whether their work experience may meet the Solicitors Regulation Authority’s QWE requirements. It explains the criteria and links to the regulator’s guidance. t supports access to legal-career information without requiring purchase of an SQE course.