1 year later....still glad u went to law school?

[zest]

Women are self-sufficient nowadays and you end up better financially when you marry! As for kids, well, they are definitely a liability, that is why many couples have only one kid, not to mention that they have the latter years after they get married!

Well, I have to disagree! I mean, while there are definitely couples that don't have kids and marry for the sake of marrying (read fun), they are few and far between. Having children is inherent in the act of marriage -- if you simply need someone to @ # ! * and not have children, you just go gay and that is it! 

[allbusiness]

As for why so many smart men and women go to business school? Men love it since it's 2 years of partying from i-banking/consulting where you were treated like a monkey. Women love it since this is the place where they can hunt down guys that are otherwise hard to find elsewhere. Business schools are not exactly casinos -- but similar to casinos you have fun while paying.

Yea right!

http://www.businessweek.com/bschools/mbajournal/03levine/3.htm

[e p i]

So basically the way they culcate the cost of attending is, for Harvard, e.g.,

tuition & living expenses $74,000 X 2 = $148,000
lost wages                        $70,000 X 2 = $140,000

total                                                $300,000

Seems to me an MBA from a top school is not only not worth it, but you have to be a complete a s s h o l e to go for it ... anyway, I was kinda wondering whether a JD from a top school is worth it when you think in the same terms as above ..

It appears an MBA would be somewhat worth it if you enter business school straight from college, that is to say having earnings potential of only, say, $40,000 -- but then again top b-schools very very rarely admit you without any relevant business experience, even if you have stellar academic credentials (say, 3.9 undergrad GPA and 730 GMAT).

[amatterof]

It appears an MBA would be somewhat worth it if you enter business school straight from college, that is to say having earnings potential of only, say, $40,000 -- but then again top b-schools very very rarely admit you without any relevant business experience, even if you have stellar academic credentials (say, 3.9 undergrad GPA and 730 GMAT).

A 3.9/730 kid would not be in his right mind to kiss business schools' asses to let him in when he could be easily accepted by Yale law or Harvard med. For one thing, if you score 730 on GMAT you'd have a LSAT 170 give or take.

Most importantly, the starting salary for a green Harvard MBA grad would be half of that of the post-MBA salary of the typical graduate with at least 4 years of work experience under his belt, whereas the baby-face, freshly graduated Yale JD or Harvard MD regularly gets $125-150K right off the bat.

[Consideration]

The College of Business offers a certification in Forensic Accounting and Fraud Investigation which is only a four course load offered during the summer. I am also thinking of completing solely this in lieu of the MBA.

[evelyn]

It appears an MBA would be somewhat worth it if you enter business school straight from college, that is to say having earnings potential of only, say, $40,000 [...]

Nice assumption! I mean, the median entry-level salary for local prosecuting attorneys and public defenders is about $40-45K. And I won't even mention a legal services organization attorney's salary ($36,000)!

Computer science or computer engineering graduates fare pretty well (around $50K a year); however, liberal arts graduates occupy the lower rungs of the pay scale at about $30K. Even business administration and economics/finance graduates probably won't make $40K a year.

[dbmuell]

I am currently a 0L so I have little insight to share on law school satisfaction.  That being said, I can tell you that working 40 hrs/wk in a job for which you have no passion makes easily as much of a dent in your personal happiness as 60hrs/wk in a job that you truly enjoy.  In my current career in the Computer Science field, I have seen both worlds. Mostly I have sat at a desk doing mundane work for eight hours a day, drawing a large pay check and watching the clock.  I have seen all of the unhappiness, greed, antisocial behavior and corporate nonesense described in the above posts and have pretty much reached the conclusion that unahppy people are everywhere and simply make their voices louder than everyone else's.  If you don't let them drag you into their mire, it won't happen.

I'm going to law school because I want to find something that I can actually get excited about waking up to go do every day.  If that means 45k/yr to start, then so be it.  If it means some extra hours, than so be it.  As long as it does not involve sitting at a computer terminal in a tiny cubicle watching the clock tick until it hits 5:00, I can't imagine regretting this decision.  I have no intentions of chasing money, prestige or any of the other nonesense that so many seem caught up in, and I think that there are a multitude of areas in the legal field in which one can find great happiness and success if they are not caught up in things like "highest starting salary."  I'm just a 0L and maybe this sounds pretty naive to those of you actually doing it but I just don't think any job can suck your soul unless you allow it to.

[GA-fan]

I am currently a 0L so I have little insight to share on law school satisfaction.  That being said, I can tell you that working 40 hrs/wk in a job for which you have no passion makes easily as much of a dent in your personal happiness as 60hrs/wk in a job that you truly enjoy.  In my current career in the Computer Science field, I have seen both worlds. Mostly I have sat at a desk doing mundane work for eight hours a day, drawing a large pay check and watching the clock.  I have seen all of the unhappiness, greed, antisocial behavior and corporate nonesense described in the above posts and have pretty much reached the conclusion that unahppy people are everywhere and simply make their voices louder than everyone else's.  If you don't let them drag you into their mire, it won't happen.

I'm going to law school because I want to find something that I can actually get excited about waking up to go do every day.  If that means 45k/yr to start, then so be it.  If it means some extra hours, than so be it.  As long as it does not involve sitting at a computer terminal in a tiny cubicle watching the clock tick until it hits 5:00, I can't imagine regretting this decision.  I have no intentions of chasing money, prestige or any of the other nonesense that so many seem caught up in, and I think that there are a multitude of areas in the legal field in which one can find great happiness and success if they are not caught up in things like "highest starting salary."  I'm just a 0L and maybe this sounds pretty naive to those of you actually doing it but I just don't think any job can suck your soul unless you allow it to.

You'd be surprised how much a year of law school can make your neurotic, OCD, and suck your life away. You should definitely come back in a year and let us know how it went. I'm not saying it's that way for everybody, but usually at least for anyone gunning for hte top 20% of the class.

[starter]

I am currently a 0L so I have little insight to share on law school satisfaction. 

You could have stopped there.

[dbmuell]

I could have but my post had nothing to do with the specifics of LS.  It's amazing how much different of a message I hear from people that went the "non-trad" route.  Most of those that I have talked to have earned some hard miles in the real world and love their law school experience.  Perhaps a lot of these complaints are not unique to law school but are everywhere in life. Perhaps an undergraduate education does not usually give you the tools to deal with them and thus the unhappiness. I don't know and I'll probably get flamed further for even suggesting it, but it does seem that those with more life experience have much happier time in law school...