There’s an excellent post over at Empirical Legal Studies that deals with the issue of “bi-modal distribution” of incomes for recent law graduates. The post notes:
… [M]easures of central tendency, such as average or median, are not necessarily reliable guides for law students’ future earning power. In conventional labor markets, that disconnect is rare.
A look at the charts posted by ELS clearly indicate why this is so- incomes are clearly grouped around two major points on the spectrum (the bi-modal distribution). Such a model can lend itself to an increasing spread between the two peaks. However, it also poses problems for law students and those considering entering the profession, as a look at the “average” salaries is actually quite misleading. Perhaps even more troubling is that the average salary”is a factor often cited by law schools as they justify their increasingly astronomical tuition rates.
While the ELS numbers are for the US market, the situation remains largely the same in Canada. Starting salaries at the big Bay Street firms in Toronto are in the range of $95,000-$105,000, but quickly drop once you leave downtown Toronto. If you work in Atlantic Canada, you can expect to make much, much less- under $50,000- even at the top regional firms. The income differential isn’t just limited to regional disparities, either- those firms that pay the highest wages are almost exclusively focused on corporate/commercial law and related services to major corporate clients. If you want to practice less lucrative areas of law, such as criminal, family, or immigration law, you’ll find an equally notable gap.
This isn’t just a concern for the legal community. The bimodal wage distribution (and law school tuition rates based on average future incomes) makes it much more difficult for those who want to practice outside the major centres or in less lucrative practice areas to do so, impacting anyone in society who may need to retain competent counsel at a reasonable rate. And unfortunately, this is a problem that is only growing worse and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.
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