Lawyers: Feast or Famine?

Published December 2, 2014

A glut. That has been the “party line” for years when discussing lawyers and whether there is an oversupply in this country. But is “glut” an accurate representation of the legal industry?

In fact, there are many people who need legal representation and no lawyers to represent them – not because the lawyers don’t exist but rather because lawyers who want to represent the underrepresented populations don’t exist in large enough numbers.

In addition to a tremendous American population, there are immigrant folks from Europe, Mexico, and South America who are in this country illegally by most standards but need representation in the justice system. In fact, there is a whole host of people needing representation, whether it be for a fender bender, a small estate, or some other matter.

Likely, there are enough lawyers to represent all of these populations, but these populations are underserved nonetheless. The reason is that most people coming out of law school – I don’t mean your mail-order law school or the fifth-tier law school, however that’s defined, but a respectable high-quality law school-have gone to law school to get a professional education so that they can maintain or enhance their family lifestyle, and they are not going to be able to do that with a volume practice.

They are not going to be able to do that unless they get General Motors or Ford or Xerox or similar businesses as clients. There is intense competition for those clients, so the perception is that there is a glut of lawyers. Clearly, the glut only refers to lawyers interested in serving wealthy clients.

Incentives for working in certain areas of the law would help even out the playing field of the business of law and benefit not only the lawyers but also those who most need the help-the clients.

Categorized in: Coaching, Ethics

Audience type: Administrators, Associates, Large Law Firms, Small Law Firms, Sole Practitioners