philly inquirer article about starting law salaries

[wooshi23]

http://www.philly.com/philly/business/20070513_Even_bigger_bucks_for_fresh_batch_of_lawyers.html

mentions temple quite a bit, thought it might interest some of you.

[savage_fred]

Nice link...thanks wooshi! I certainly don't expect to be making $140,000 out of law school, nor would I have the nerve to ask for such a large salary. I think a lot of first year students expect this sort of compensation and many of them will probably be shocked to realize that they won't be making the BIG $$$ and have $150,000 in debt to pay. I don't expect the legal market to be booming 3 years from now...then again there are a large number of baby boomer attorneys headed for retirement soon. I don't know where I'm going with this, but minimize debt is the moral.

[wooshi23]

Honestly, what surprised me was that the article mentioned the average temple grad only has $60k in law school debt- I thought that number would be a bit higher. I know that I am expecting to have to take out a bit more that that, though I am planning on studying abroad part of my 1st summer so that adds almost 10k to the overall debt (eep!)

I don't expect to make over 100k my first year, though it would be fabulous, but I do plan/hope to make in the 80-100k range. I think thats relatively reasonable if I manage to stay on the top 1/3 or so of the class.


at my previous job I recieved a lot of young lawyer applicants applying for residency in the building and most made in the 70-110 range- I think almost all of them were temple grads. The only ones I remember making in the 130's + had gone to harvard/penn/etc. so I definetly agree that we shouldn't be expecting to be making that kind of money.

[PhilaGirl]

I read this article the other day and had pretty much the same feelings as you guys.  But I think the number of firms who pay this much represents a very, very small slice of the legal market in Philly, so I'm not taking it too much to heart.  Honestly, I'd much prefer an $80K job with a life, so I hope the majority of the law firms here don't slavishly follow the trend of bigger dollars/unattainable billables.

$60K average debt seemed low to me, too, but when I think about my projected debt, it could be as little as about $45K if I keep my scholarship and my living situation changes next year, which would certainly average out, say, a PA resident paying full price.  So while I think that the average debt for our class will be probably go up, maybe closer to $70K, it's not completely unrealistic.