Too Many Lawyers, Not Enough Jobs : Justice Lost

Ever wonder why the justice system is so screwed up? Why everyone is suing everyone else at the drop of the hat? Too many lawyers and not enough justice.

Supply and demand should be the rule of the day, that is let the free market take care of students and schools accountability. What was inevitable  was the student loan business went out of control when the Mr Obama's administration took over the student loan business from the banks.

The student loan debt is now more then $1.3 trillion and rising. That Mr Obama took over this business is not by accident or miscalculation, this was by design. What better way to control millions of people, especially the young, then to drive them into debt and make them dependent on others for years to come. And, of course, to vote for those that promise they will take of them into the foreseeable future.

Need some proof? Hillary is on track when she's promising $350 billion more taxpayer monies for student loan relief. Now if you are a student in serious debt, who will you vote for?

Too Many Law Students, Too Few Legal Jobs
Source: Steven J. Harper, "Too Many Law Students, Too Few Legal Jobs," New York Times, August 25, 2015.

August 26, 2015

Law school graduates are having a difficult time finding long-term employment in their field. Nevertheless, law schools have been able to keep raising tuition in spite of producing many more graduates than the market can absorb, writes Steven J. Harper for the New York Times.

The main reason lies in the availability of federal loans regardless of the prospect of employment. Law school students now accumulate debt ranging from $88,000 for public schools to $127,000 for private ones. Law schools obtain a great percentage of their revenues from tuition so they have an incentive to maintain large student bodies but they have no responsibility for the debt the students have incurred even when the possibilities of finding a job are grim.

These conditions have led to schools operating without any accountability and students and taxpayers bearing the price. A task force created by the American Bar Association suggested the following:

Require schools to share in the responsibility for repaying the loans.
Capping law student loans.
Even eliminating the federal student loan program in its current form.

The task force, however, claimed that the market would take care of this situation and although enrollment decreased from 2010 to 2014, it didn't declined at a pace required to reach equilibrium. Instead, the task force recommended other less effective measures (such as offering better debt counseling) that will not solve this crisis.

Unless student loans bear a realistic relationship to employment outcomes, law schools will take advantage of their lack of accountability and the legal education market will continue generating a supply and demand imbalance.